All Hallows-Symphony In 3 Movements

All Hallows is a poem based on the musical form of a symphony. The first movement centres on the life and work of Raymond Garlick, the Anglo-Welsh poet, pacifist, nationalist and erstwhile Catholic. It ironically parodies the first chapter of job to explore the imaginative disaster that the defeat of Welsh Devolution in the Referendum of 1979 posed for a whole generation of nationalists. The poetry is by turns surreal, ironic and warmly appreciative of human worth and suffering. The second movement is a meditation on Sadam Husseins military convoys wrecked in the desert like iron graveyards. In context, 'Soldier' represents the military option-the IRA, the French Resistance, the Tamil Tigers, or the sixth-century Gododdin expedition against the English-which Garlick repudiated; as well as the power of the benevolent military of the British State. The third movement is about the work and death of Paul Davies, an artist who represented a new wave of nationalism-radical, socialist, modern: yet claiming the past, both for its working-class resistance to power and for its sense of the human need for redemption. Tony Conran was born in India but has lived in north Wales for most of his life. He is much admired as a poet, dramatist, critic and translator of Welsh-language poetry, and his work is widely published. His two most recent collections of poetry, Blodeuwedd (1988) and Castles (1993) were both awarded Arts Council of Wales prizes.