Richard Llewellyn
Richard Llewellyn (real name Richard Dafydd Vivian Llewellyn Lloyd) was a British novelist.
Llewellyn was born of Welsh parents in Hendon, north London in 1906. Only after his death was it discovered that his claim that he was born in St. Davids, West Wales was false, though of course he was of Welsh blood.
Several of his novels dealt with a Welsh theme, the best-known being How Green Was My Valley (1939), which won international acclaim and was made into a classic Hollywood film. It immortalised the way of life of the South Wales Valleys coal mining communities, where Llewellyn spent a small amount of time with his grandfather. Three sequels followed.
He lived a peripatetic life, travelling widely throughout his life. Before World War II, he spent periods working in hotels, wrote a play, worked as a coal miner and produced his best known novel. During World War II, he rose to the rank of Captain in the Welsh Guards. Following the war, he worked as a journalist, covering the Nuremberg Trials, and then as a screenwriter for MGM. Late in his life, he lived in Eilat, Israel.
Protagonists who assume new identities, often because they are transplanted into foreign cultures, are a recurring element in Llewellyn's novels, including a spy adventure that extends through several volumes.
Llewellyn married twice: his first wife was Nona Sonstenby, whom he married in 1952 and divorced in 1968, and his second wife was Susan Heimann, whom he married in 1974.
“There is a fool you feel when somebody is saying they are sorry for doing something to you. It is worse than if you had done something yourself. So you are having the worst of it twice, start and finish.”
“Never mind what you feel. Think. Watch. Think again. And then one step at a time to put things right. As a mason puts one block at a time. To build solid and good. So with thought. Think. Build one thought at a time. Think solid. Then act. Is it?”
“What is there, in the mention of Time To Come, that is so quick to wrench at the heart, to inflict a pain in the senses that is like the run of a sword, I wonder. Perhaps we feel our youngness taken from us without the soothe of sliding years, and the pains of age that come to stand unseen beside us and grow more solid as the minutes pass, are with us solid on the instant, and we sense them, but when we try to assess them, they are back again in their places down in Time To Come, ready to meet us coming.”
“Hard it is to suffer through stupid people. They make you feel sorry for them, and if your sorrow is as great as your hurt, you will allow them to go free of punishment, for their eyes are the eyes of dogs that have done wrong and know it, and are afraid.”
“It do seem to me that the life of man is merely a pattern scrawled on Time, with little thought, little care, and no sense of design. Why is it, I wonder, that people suffer, when there is so little need, when an effort of will and some hard work would bring them from their misery into peace and contentment.”
“I wonder is happiness only an essence of good living, that you shall taste only once or twice while you live, and then go on living with the taste in your mouth, and wishing you had the fullness of it solid between your teeth, like a good meal that you have tasted and cherished and look back in your mind to eat again.”
“Why is it, I wonder, that people suffer, when there is so little need, when an effort of will and some hard work would bring them from their misery into peace and contentment.”
“... the nose. It can be a nuisance in winter and such a blessing before a meal.”
“How can there be fury felt for things that are gone to dust.”
“Everywhere was singing, all over the house was singing, and outside the house was alive with singing, and the very air was song.”
“There is beautiful you are.""No," said Marged, between a sigh and a sob."Yes," said Owen."No," said Marged, not so certain."Behold," Owen said, from Solomon. "thou art fair. Thou hast dove's eyes.""Dove's eyes are small." Marged said."Yours are so big they are my whole world," said Owen.”
“Men lose their birthrights for a mess of pottage only if they stop using the gifts given them by God for their betterment. By prayer. That is the first and greatest gift. Use the gift of prayer. Ask for strength of mind, and a clear vision. Then sense. Use your sense. … Think long and well. By prayer and good thought you will conquer all enemies.”
“How green was my valley then, and the valley of them that have gone.”
“But you have gone now, all of you that were so beautiful when you were quick with life. Yet not gone, for you are still a living truth inside my mind. So how are you dead, my brothers and sisters, and all of you , when you live with me as surely as I live with myself.”
“I saw my father as a man, and not, as a man who was my father.”
“Oh there is lovely to feel a book, a good book, firm in the hand, for its fatness holds rich promise, and you are hot inside to think of good hours to come.”
“O, there is lovely to feel a book, a good book, firm in the hand, for its fatness holds rich promise, and you are hot inside to think of good hours to come.”
“And under my breath I was telling it to hisht and for shame, and if I had known any swearing I would have had that in, too.”