There Was a Young Man from Cardiff

Seren Classics

by Dannie Abse

Poet, novelist, playwright, diaryist, anthologist and broadcaster, Dannie Abse has contributed hugely to literature in Britain. In There was a Young Man from Cardiff he presents a series of deceptions - or are they? - which ask about the nature of 'truth' and 'reality'.

Characters and events materialise and change as though a mist swirls around them: twins appear and disappear in 'Madagascar'; 'The Marvellous Girl' echoes the 'marvellous boy' of Chatterton, whose writing fooled the literary world.

Behind these fictions is the young Dannie, newly qualified doctor struggling to grasp the post-war world of adults, relationships, family and illness. His progress towards a better understanding of life is mirrored by his development as a writer. Charming, quirky, Dannie Abse's fiction is a world in which everyday surfaces are underlain by the strange, scarcely understood currents of human nature.

234 pages, Paperback

First published June 15, 1991

About the author

Daniel Abse CBE FRSL (1923–2014) was a Welsh poet, author, doctor and playwright. He wrote and edited more than sixteen books of poetry, as well as fiction and a range of other publications. His poetry won him many awards. As a medic, he worked in a chest clinic for over 30 years.

See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dannie_...

Reviews

[Denni]

I love Dannie Abse's poetry and prose, but hadn't read this book till now (thank you, Gwynedd Library Service), and it's another good, interesting, entertaining and thoughtful semi-autobiographical volume. I love the way he doesn't spell out the way either he or the reader ought to respond (most of the time), I love it for the strong sense of the past in south Wales, of childhood's misdemeanours and worries, of the quandries facing a young person (even then, though we might think otherwise, it was never easy), and the mstakes we all make when dealing with other people. A lovely book by a very humane human being.