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Born
in Brockley, Kent, to a Welsh father and English mother,
Jones studied at the Camberwell School of Art from 1910
to 1914. After being rejected by the Artists' Rifles,
he enlisted in the Royal Welch Fusiliers as a private.
Most of his first year was spent training before his
battalion crossed over to France in December 1915. He
survived the opening of the Battle of the Somme but
was wounded in the leg on 11 July 1916 in the attack
on Mametz Wood. Back in action by October, he contracted
severe trench fever and left France in February 1918.
He was unable to return before the war ended and was
demobilised in 1919. Later that year he accepted a grant
to work at Westminster School of Art.
Jones
lived alone, often in poverty and ill-health, but was
supported by friends. His major work, In Parenthesis,
begun in 1927 and based on his wartime experiences,
did not appear until 1937. It is a difficult, complex
text, both poetry and prose, interweaving episodes from
previous wars portrayed in literature, and influenced
in part by T S Eliot's The Waste Land. Jones
continued to work as an artist and poet, and major retrospective
exhibitions of his drawings and paintings were held
both before and after his death.
David
Jones Society
Lecture, 24 January 2003
All Day Symposium, 28 March 2003
Members only, for further information
Tel: 01792 206144
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