UP, INTO THE SINGING MOUNTAIN

by Richard Llewellyn ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 4, 1959

Nineteen years ago How Green Was My Valley rode triumphantly over the difficulties of the Welsh turn of phrase, the names, the remoteness of the setting, to almost immediate recognition of its essential quality as a saga of a people. Now comes another Huw Morgan narrative, stronger in plot values, less compelling on its emotional levels, but again having the sweep of saga in its rhythms of speech and tale. Huw writes of his silent departure from the temptations of nearness to Bron, his widowed sister-in-law; of his shipping for South America and setting up- in a Welsh community there- a carpentry shop which won immediate success. The pull of nationality seems even stronger, transplanted to a distant land, and one senses the undercurrents of violence, of loyalties, of feeling for the soil they are making their own and the villages they are creating. Huw falls deeply in love with the eldest of three sisters, held in thrall by their powerful and dominant father. But he has set up housekeeping, so the village feels, with the Widow Glyn, who has designs on him (as apparently have other maidens in the community). This thread of involved romance plays back and forth through issues that stir the whole community, until threat of disaster on a grand scale from the flooding river draws them together. No one will ever forget the flood in the earlier book; the one in this is on even a grander scale. Llewellyn has- in the years between- gone far from the mood and scene of his first book. This- though in less compelling terms- has recaptured much of the essence of a people.

Pub Date: Feb. 4, 1959

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1959

Categories: FICTION