Complex and controversial issues have accompanied the development of English-language literature in Wales, generating a continuing debate over the nature of Welsh writing in English. The main issues include the claim of some Welsh-language writers to represent the only authentic literature of Wales, the question of whether or not an extended literary tradition in English has existed in Wales, the absence (until fairly recently) of a publishing apparatus for English-language writers, the rise of a Welsh nationalism committed to preserving the Welsh language, and the question of whether English-language literature in Wales can be distinguished from English literature proper. The primary impulse for the interviews with the thirteen writers and editors in Writing on the Edge was to explore these and other issues relating to the literary and cultural identity in Wales in the last decade. The book's title reflects these ongoing debates about the nature and direction of contemporary Welsh literature in English, which is often perceived as peripheral both to Welsh-speaking Wales and to the literary culture of England. As one of the contributors to the volume says This is what it is to be Welsh ... It's an edge. There's no moment of life in Wales that hasn't got that edge, unless you decide you're not Welsh.

In Writing at the Edge, Jeff Park invites the reader to see personal writing as the metaphorical space where individuals negotiate meaning with others and the world. Drawing upon writing process theory, curriculum theory, narrative theory, and many years of practice, this book explores writing in relation to the «self», but dares to include the multiplicities and contradictions of social and cultural constructions of gender, power, and politics. Park uses the metaphor of the «riparian zone» to reconsider the value of writing as a site of negotiation of self, culture, and society. This book is the best of curriculum theory and narrative inquiry, as well as a stunning invitation to those working in language arts, writing, and teacher education to reconsider personal writing as a place of great diversity, beauty, and paradox.

Wotton Writers Group is a mixture of published local authors and enthusiastic amateurs, who meet once a month to socialise and practise their skills. This can take the form of writing to a prompt or sometimes critiquing shared pieces of work. They write poetry as well as prose and welcome writers whatever their genre. In this their second anthology, you will find an entertaining mix – from the observational to the unexpected, historical to the modern day, science fiction to horror, the living room to the magic portal – you are invited to step into other worlds of their creation.

A stirring account of Spain’s incursion into the New World. Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo is the 16th-century author of Historia general y natural de las Indias, a general and natural history of the peoples and places he encountered in his travels to Spanish America. Oviedo was educated at the court of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella and held several early appointments to the royal household, first as page to their son, John. In 1513, he accepted the appointment as warden of the gold mines of Castilla de Oro on the Isthmus of Panama in Darién, the first viable Spanish settlement on the American mainland. His first year at the very edge of the known world converted Oviedo into a lifelong resident of America and, more importantly, marked the beginning of his campaign to appropriate the topic of the Indies and become its interpreter to Europe. As G. F. Dille points out in his introduction, this work earned Oviedo the title of many firsts—first historian, first enthographer, first naturalist, first anthropologist, and first sociologist of the New World. Dille adds to that list first autobiographer and first novelist of the Americas. This annotated translation contains the section of Oviedo’s work that recounts his experience in the New World during his service in Panama. Dille includes a brief introduction to Oviedo and provides general information on the political background of Spain and on the Spanish colonial system, the printing history of the text, a description of the reception of Oviedo’s work, and notes on the translation.

A literary study of the borderlands between Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

With a special focus on education and underrepresented geographical locations, this book is an inclusive collection of theories, discourses, art, identities, and practices related to this discipline.