FEET IN CHAINS
a novel by Kate Roberts
Translated from the original Welsh
by John Idris Jones
paperback;
133 pages;
ISBN 978-1-871083-80-4;
£7.99
This is the story of Jane and Ifan Gruffydd
and their children who live in a small-holding
in the hills near Caernarfon.
The account begins in 1880 and ends
during the Great War.
It describes a proud community
facing economic oppression
at a time when traditional ways
and morals are loosening.
"Kate Roberts is Wales's greatest novelist in Welsh,
and this is her greatest novel...
She sets a daunting task: to cover almost 40 years
of a family's history in 133 pages.
The descriptive passages in this translation remain masterful, and the hatred, yet powerlessness,
of this corner of Arfon against World War One are
sharply illuminated in a magnificent closing chapter."
The Western Mail
"I urge it strongly for its distillation of time
and place and people
ground between the upper and nether millstone
but triumphantly alive in their own small corner."
The Guardian