Ash on a Young Man's Sleeve

Ash on a Young Man's Sleeve is an autobiographical account of growing up Welsh and Jewish, in the period leading up to and during the Second World War. Throughout the text there's the rumblings of war, references to Hitler, and references to events that seem so much more important in the Welsh liter......more

Brilliant, a poetic and moving autobiographical novel based on the writer's 1930s childhood and teenage years. It ends with him turning 18, which coincides with the start of the Second World War. Abse captures brilliantly, many little details and observations about his family, friends, the local Jew......more

I've had this book sitting on my shelf for a few years and can't imagine now why I didn't read it sooner. Dannie Abse is a poet and a doctor, and his two older brothers Wilfred and Leo were respectively a psychiatrist and a politician, but here we see them all as boys and teenagers. The prose is lum......more

This is one from childhood that I've just revisited twenty years latter! Semi-autobiographical, the reader joins Danny growing up in Cardiff. Some fantastic insights into welsh life before and after the war. As a budding writer his style is a real inspiration. The characters, such as the bruiser Unc......more

I probably would have given this three stars if I wasn't from Cardiff and didn't love local history so much. I enjoyed Abse's poetic musings on long gone transport and places around Penylan Hill which were once fields. His lads' camping holiday to Ogmore is also a highlight, while the ever-present m......more