Sam Adams

Sam Adams was born in 1934 in the coal mining village of Gilfach Goch, Glamorgan, where his father was a colliery electrician. He was educated at the local boys' elementary school, Tonyrefail GS and UCW Aberystwyth, where he graduated in English and gained an MA by research on Thomas Hood. He taught English in a comprehensive school in Bristol and was a senior lecturer at Caerleon College of Education before joining HM Inspectorate of Schools (Wales). His writing developed alongside his career in the education service, but began reaching a wider audience when he joined Meic Stephens' magazine Poetry Wales, first as reviews editor and later as editor. He has contributed poems, articles and reviews to all the leading magazines of Welsh writing in English since the 1970s. He has published three monographs, on Geraint Goodwin, Roland Mathias and T J Llewelyn Prichard, in the Writers of Wales series, is the editor of the Collected Poems and Collected Short Stories of Roland Mathias, and has produced a number of scholarly articles on Prichard in the International Journal of Welsh Writing in English. He is also the author of three volumes of poetry and two novels: Prichard's Nose (2010) and In the Vale (2019). A third novel, The Road to Zarauz, is due to appear in Spring 2020. His contributions to the Carcanet Press magazine PN Review since 1982 include more than 120 Letters from Wales.