Thomas J. Taylor - The Ohio State University (retired)

Bore da, (or Prynnhawn da)

I wish to speak to the international importance and influence of the Center for Performance Research. CPR is the focal point for a multi-national group of scholars, theorists, archivists, and performance artists, as well as a creative fount in its own right.

I have joined dozens, perhaps hundreds, of colleagues as conventionee , debater, performance witness, and organization representative, around the important inter-disciplinary field of performance theory (a psychological, business, and sociology discipline, as well as artistic) on a half dozen occasions in Aberystwyth and in Pembrokeshire, and have done scholarship at the CPR facilities and at the Welsh Library as a guest of CPR. I have explored business opportunities with the Welsh Chamber of Commerce in Aber, and spent time with my family in Carnafeon and Cardigan.

My point is that CPR is the doorway for many into the sophistication of Welsh art.
I have spent thousands of U.S. dollars in Wales because of CPR – not just at pubs. I have sent books from Hay-on-Wye to U.S. and Canadian university libraries; I have scraped rental car mirrors on narrow roads from Fishguard to Snowdon; my grand nephew’s bedroom sports a large Welsh flag on the wall; my internet password is “ysgol” (although I’ll have to change it now).

If you want the international community – I have met scholars and artists from India, South America, Poland, Corsica, Germany, Switzerland, and elsewhere at events sponsored by CPR – to think of Wales as a cultural, scholarly, and artistic hub – rather than just “Tom Jones singing Delilah at a football match” or a cluster of stone cottages turned into English summer homes – you have got to fund CPR (and the nearby University of Wales library) at the highest possible level. Wales’ language and culture are as fragile as the blown-glass dragon I held on my lap on one of my flights home (too delicate for luggage); I am not Welsh, but I married a Griffith and have been to an Eistedffod, all because CPR invited me and over a hundred international scholars to Aberyswyth for a wonderful convention. I have drawn labyrinths in the sand and sung songs in a sea cave at a CPR retreat in Pembrokeshire, and have eaten leek soup in Portmadog.

Please excuse any misspellings of Welsh words here – I can’t get to my Welsh dictionary right now, due to house repairs going on.

Yours truly,


Thomas J. Taylor, Ph.D.
The Ohio State University (retired)