Encyclopaedia

BORROW, George (1803–81) Writer

Norfolk-born George Borrow earned a living from hackwork in which he was able to use his extraordinary talent for languages; he claimed to have learned Welsh from a stable-lad in Norwich when still a boy. His book Wild Wales (1862), perhaps the most famous of its genre, is an account of an 1854 walking tour. Its unique charm lies in the author’s enthusiasm for the language, antiquities and topography of Wales, which sometimes betrays an almost comic reverence, and in his forthright opinions of the people and places he encounters along the way. He was reasonably fluent in Welsh and, although taken for a southerner in the north and a northerner in the south, he insisted on speaking the language at every opportunity. It was the wild scenery and literary associations of north Wales that appealed to him most; the industrial south appalled him. Fond of his beer, of robust build and not averse to fisticuffs when in a tight corner, this staunch churchman nevertheless found much to praise in the character of the Nonconformist Welsh.