Page 28 - Ninnau Jan-Feb 2021

Jan Morris, ‘a poet of time, place and self,’ has died at 94

By James Thomas from Christ Church, Oxford, in nership in 2008. As Elizabeth
1951. "Oxford made me," Jan said, “It did not make any dif-
Jan Morris, one of the finest Morris later wrote. ference to me…I made my mar-
writers Britain produced in the While at school, he met riage vows 59 years ago and
post-war era, died on 20 Elizabeth Tuckniss. “They felt still have them.”
November 2020 at 94 in an instant bond and Morris felt Though born in England,
Pwllheli near her home of rescued by this intense love,” Morris was proud of being
Llanystumdwy in Gwynedd, wrote Sarah Anderson of The Welsh. She wrote of her new
North Wales. Her son, the poet Independent. They married in home country in Wales: the
Twm Morys, confirmed it but 1949 and had five children. First Place (1982), The Matter
did not give a cause. With a life As a correspondent starting of Wales: Epic Views of a Small
story full of discovery, for The Times in 1951, he “was Country (1984), and A Writer’s
romance, and adventure, the a sucker for the romance of House in Wales (2002). She was
BBC said, “She was a soldier, newspapers.” He then estab- elected to the Gorsedd of Bards
an award-winning journalist, a lished his reputation with the in 1992 and accepted a CBE
novelist and, as a travel writer, successful 1953 British Mt. Jan Morris from Her Majesty the Queen in
became a poet of time, place Everest expedition as the revolutionary Che Guevara in when he finally transitioned 1999 out of “polite respect,”
and self.” embedded reporter who scram- Havana and British defector and from male to female. Jan while personally holding mem-
As Veronica Horwell of The bled down the mountain to base Soviet spy Guy Burgess in Morris’s first book afterward bership in Plaid Cymru. “I am
Guardian wrote, “The greatest camp and sent off the message Moscow. During those peri- was Conundrum , her personal emotionally in thrall to
distance travelled by Jan Morris that Edmund Hillary and patetic days, he became “a narrative of transsexualism. “I Welshness,” she declared.
was between extraordinary Tenzing Norgay had reached writer who travels.” realized that I had been born Her extraordinary life has no
identities” – from the journalist the top. Flashed to London, the But the book that launched into the wrong body, and should official biographer. “I’ve writ-
James Morris, who got the story, “Everest Conquered,” his post-journalistic life was really be a girl.” It was her ten it all myself – in these forty
scoop on the conquest of Mt. broke on 2 June 1953, the morn- Venice (1960), a biography of belief that, while sex is physi- books. There’s nothing more to
Everest, to the early transgender ing of the coronation of Queen the city that won the Royal cal, gender is of the mind, it’s say. It’s all vanity.” The book
voyager Jan Morris, who report- Elizabeth II. Morris later noted, Society of Literature spiritual. “After all, it’s not nat- she likes the best, “that’s near-
ed from rarely explored territory “I think for sheer exuberance, Heinemann Award in 1961. The ural to do what I’ve done. Yet I est to art,” is Trieste and the
in 1974 and “boldly sent back the best day of my life was my Morris approach was “less a feel natural. I feel myself at Meaning of Nowhere (2001), a
an early dispatch” in her mem- last on Everest.” His book about case of finding a voice and last.” meditation on “the self and its
oir, Conundrum. it, Coronation Everest, was not more the voice finding some- But not everything was tran- confabulation of psychic history
Born as James Humphrey published until 1958, since The thing that was right for it” and quil. “I was about to change my and accidents of geography.” Of
Morris on 2 October 1926 in Times did not allow its corre- then running “about the city like form and apparency – my sta- her last book, she said, “I began
Clevedon, Somerset, England, spondents to write books. a mad dog, sniffing for vital tus, too, perhaps my place to think all life was allegory, my
he was the youngest of three He left that paper over its trivia.” The book’s intensity of among my peers,…my manner own life was allegory. So I
sons of Walter Morris, a Welsh lackluster coverage of the Suez detail still hooks readers. of life, my prospects, my emo- called the book Allegorisings…
engineer from “a line of decent, Crisis in 1956, joined The Morris left newspapers entire- tions, possibly my abilities.” So when I kick the bucket, the
proud people,” and Enid Payne Guardian and uncovered proof ly for personal urban geography But her writing voice continued, presses will roll.”
Morris. He started at 16 on the that Britain and France, under and impressionistic history, pro- sounding certain, as if she The presses may be rolling
Western Daily Press in Bristol the guise of a peace mission ducing vivid portraits of cities “strode about the world now and the memorial stone has
before joining the 9th Queen’s between Egypt and Israel, had in Oxford (1965), The Great whistling.” come out from under the house
Royal Lancers, serving as an in fact colluded to invade Port: A Passage Through New At age 46, Morris traveled to stairs for an island in the River
intelligence officer in Italy dur- Egyptian territory. British mili- York (1969), and Hong Kong Casablanca, Morocco, for the Dwyfor near Trefan Morys. It’s
ing World War II. He turned 21 tary forces were withdrawn and (1988), and of empires, such as operation and divorced his wife, inscribed in Welsh and English
aboard a troop train travelling Prime Minister Anthony Eden the Pax Britannica Trilogy since same-sex marriages were and waits now for Jan. and later
from Egypt to Palestine. After a resigned. Morris also reported (1968-78). illegal at the time. After living for Elizabeth: “Here are two
civilian stint working for a on the trial of Nazi war criminal Morris published under his together as “sisters-in-law,” the friends, Jan and Elizabeth, at the
Cairo news agency, he went Adolph Eichmann in Jerusalem birth name James until 1972, couple reunited in a civil part- end of one life.”
back to Britain and graduated and interviewed Communist

Harold Evans, A Professional Life in Three Act sends at 92

By James Thomas Harold Matthew Evans was became PBS mini-series and an
born on 28 June 1928 in NPR broadcast special. From
Sir Harold Evans, the most Manchester, England, the oldest 2001 onward Evans also con-
admired journalist of his gener- of four sons, to Welsh parents tributed to The Week magazine,
ation in Britain and author, pub- of “the self-consciously The Guardian, BBC Radio 4,
lisher, and luminary in America, respectable working class,” and Reuters.
died at 92 on 23 September Frederick Evans, a railroad In the 1980s and 90s, Evans
2020, in New York. His wife, engineer, Mary Haselum Evans, and Brown became “the king
Tina Brown, former editor of a shopkeeper, with a grandfa- and queen of Manhattan’s
Vanity Fair and The New ther from Llanraeadr ym media set, inspiring loathing
Yorker, confirmed the cause as Mochnant in Powys. and adoration in equal mea-
congestive heart failure. In their On holiday in North Wales in sure,” according to Paul Harris
American years, Evans and 1940, young Harry met several in The Guardian. Jacob
Brown together dazzled and dis- soldiers evacuated from Bernstein at The New York
mayed the glitterati in New Dunkirk whose personal stories Times said of the power couple,
York. didn’t match the official “One of her gifts was making
Language in the service of accounts of “The Miracle” of the fun stuff serious, turning
“actual facts” and truth was his World War II. As he relates in Harold Evans pop culture into sociology. One
strength. His 2017 book Do I his 2009 autobiography My of his was making the serious
Make Myself Clear? claims, Paper Chase, the encounter where his journalist team helped socially in New York, I find I stuff fun.”
“English is being mangled. sparked his commitment to the expose Kim Philby, head of am without any residual emo- He was honored with the
Write down what you mean and facts that he carried throughout British anti-Soviet intelligence, tional hostility. I have to remind Hopkins Medal by the St.
move on.” The book’s subtitle, his career. as a Russian spy. Government myself that Lucifer is the most David’s Society of New York
Why Writing Well Matters, He also fell in love with charges that his reports had arresting character in Milton’s “for the advancement of Welsh
clearly shows the influence of movies. “Hollywood reinforced jeopardized national security Paradise Lost. genius in every field” in 1993,
George Orwell, who wrote, my infatuation with newspa- were finally dropped in embar- Starting in 1984, Evans’s the same year he became an
“Emptying words of meaning is pers. I identified with the small- rassment. His triumphant 1968 American act two career includ- American citizen. Journalists in
an essential step on the road to town editor standing up to the campaign against the infamous ed positions at the New York
autocratic rule.” crooks, the tough reporter win- German pill Thalidomide estab- Daily News, Condé Nast 2002 voted him Britain’s great-
As for Evans, “The fog that ning the story and the girl, and lished the paper as a leading Traveler, and Random House est newspaper editor of all time.
envelops English is not just a the foreign correspondent out- investigative journal. Marketed where, from 1990 to 1997, he And in 2004, he was knighted
question of good taste, style, witting enemy agents.” to pregnant women as a seda- published Norman Mailer, by The Queen for “services to
and aesthetics. It is a moral He left school at 16 to work at tive, the drug had a nasty habit Henry Kissinger, and Marlon journalism.”
issue. Deceit is a moral issue. a local newspaper, the quiet of causing birth defects. The Brando. “He came to symbolize Evans is survived by his sec-
People are not allowed to see beginning to his first profes- scandal was retold in the 2016 an era of change in publishing, ond wife, Tina Brown, and their
things which are to their benefit sional act. He served in the documentary Attacking the according to Robert McFadden son George and daughter Isabel
but are obscured by language.” Royal Air Force, graduated Devil: Harold Evans and the of The New York Times, “Mr. and by his son Michael and
While he regarded all language from Durham University, then Last Nazi War Crime. Evans…turned profits, pro- daughters Ruth and Kate from
is metaphor that never fully moved to the Manchester When Rupert Murdoch voked resentment and admira-
touches the truth regardless of Evening News. In 1961, he bought the Times Newspapers tion, and created a buzz more his first marriage to Enid Evans
the clarity of the prose, he put became the crusading editor for in 1981, he appointed Evans often associated with from 1953 to 1978.
his faith in the reader. His sense Darlington’s Northern Echo, editor of the daily Times. After Hollywood movies than books.” Through it all, he never lost
of humor helped when he pro- where he turned the wrongful resigning a year later over “poli- During his time as editor of his passion for newspapers.
posed the Evans Corollaries to conviction of a man hanged for cy differences,” he explained in The Atlantic from 1997 to 2000, “How delicious the smell of the
Gresham’s Law, “Bad words murder into a crusade that led to his 1983 book Good Times, Bad he simultaneously entered his still warm newsprint!” he rhap-
drive out the good,” and to a posthumous pardon and cul- Times, “At its highest levels, a third act as a writer of American sodized in My Paper Chase. He
Murphy’s Law, “Anything that minated in abolishing the death great newspaper is not simply a history. His best-known books was always a muckraker at
goes wrong will always be penalty in Britain. personal possession but a public are The American Century heart. “If there isn’t any argu-
wordier than anything that goes In 1967, he was named editor trust.” He later said of Murdoch, (1998) and its sequel, They ment,” he once said, “there’s
right.” of London’s Sunday Times “When I come across him Made America (2004), that also not much of a newspaper.”

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Page 28 NINNAU - The North American Welsh Newspaper January-February 2021