One final blog to remember Glyn.

Glyn Idris Jones died peacefully at home in Vamos Crete on Wednesday 2 April 2014 at 3:30pm. 

Sitting here at his desk surrounded by all of his things in life, makes it all the more unbelievable that he has gone. The official reason was that his organs failed due to his on-going heart condition, but we think that he gave so much of his heart to everyone else that he left so little for himself.

Glyn was not a talkative man but anyone who has read his blogs knows that he was a kind and sensitive man, he railed against the injustices of life, he saw all forms of organised religion as part of that injustice, but he never failed to help anyone in need. He participated in many causes for the rights and freedom of people and animals around the world. 

He inspired so many people throughout his life, as a director, actor, teacher and writer. For his funeral Glyn had requested that there be no ceremony, no pomp, just a quiet passing and a gathering of friends. 

We had chosen three short passages to read from Glyn's autobiography because, they sum up succinctly how we all felt.

The first is a quote from Kai Lung's Golden Hours by Ernest Bramah. Glyn told the story of when he was a schoolboy, how he had read this book and said to himself that, if ever he wrote his own story he wanted this as a prologue.

"It is scarcely to be expected that one who has spent his life beneath an official umbrella, should have at his command the finer analogies between light and shade."

The second was a letter from one of his students at James Madison University, Virginia, USA.

28th April 1985

"Glyn,

Sometime during semester someone asked me who the best director was I ever worked with and I said Glyn Jones. I explained that I liked him because he has definite ideas that he communicates well, he is knowledgeable about a variety of technical aspects and they aren’t shrouded [sic] in some ego. I learned so much working with you, not necessarily big things, but lots of little things which are perhaps more useful. You are probably the most patient and in command, though not in a manipulative sense, director I’ve known. Now, working with you as an actor, I am fairly overwhelmed at the magnitude of your abilities. Much of what you possess is what I wish to aspire to. Thanks for coming to JMU because you have truly inspired me.

Sincere thanks and best wishes

Gregg O’Donnell

BURIED CHILD.”

And finally in his own words.

"There have been so many many people influencing my life, whose love and friendship I have appreciated and who I would like to have mentioned, and to them all I can only apologise, hand on heart, that in this writing they have been neglected. Perhaps if I had spent my life in the shade of an official umbrella there would have been fewer, but my life would have been so much the poorer for it. To all, I can only say a heartfelt thank you. G.I.J."

27th April 1931 - 2nd April 2014

The play is over,

tired, he sleeps.

Christopher Beeching and Douglas Foote