Peter Llewellyn-Jones - Last Word
Matthew Bannister: We're very grateful to Last Word listener Rachel Llewellyn-Jones, who got in touch to suggest we cover her father's life. Peter Llewellyn-Jones played a key role in the development of British Sign Language, helping to create the profession of sign language interpreter and train the next generation. As well as interpreting on TV and at theatres, Peter was also involved in the academic development of the language at several universities. Graham Turner is Policy and Research Lead at the British Deaf Association. He told me that when Peter began his work in the 1970s, signing as a means of communication for deaf people was not in a strong place
Graham Turner: British Sign Language was not even recognised as a language. It hadn't even acquired the name British Sign Language. So at the time, you know, people thought of signing as an unstructured gesture, and even deaf parents would tell their children not to sign in public because it was so poorly understood in the wider society and often actually mocked because people didn't realise it was a full and proper language.
Matthew Bannister: Peter Llewellyn Jones left school aged 16 with four O’levels. His father, who was a vicar, encouraged him to train as a welfare worker for deaf people. Peter combined this with part-time acting jobs. It soon became clear that his mix of skills was perfect for increasing the profile of sign language interpreting.
ARCHIVE: 1981 Labour Party Conference
Female Presenter 1: Also in 1981, sign language interpreters were present for the first time ever at party political conferences. In October, See Hear's Martin Colville attended the Labour Party's conference in Brighton, where Peter Llewellyn-Jones was interpreting the speeches.
Male Presenter 2: Peter, why do you think that this is so important?
Peter Llewellyn-Jones: Well, it really is very important because it's the first time that deaf people have ever had an opportunity to go to the conferences themselves.
Graham Turner: He appeared in an early ITV educational programme with Victoria Wood, in fact, co-presenting
ARCHIVE
Super Sign.
Graham Turner: And Peter signed and spoke in that programme. And that was one of the earliest instances where sign language was used in educational programming on television in the UK.
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Peter Llewellyn-Jones: The main point of the programme is that it's a teaching English series for middle-school deaf children. And what we've tried to do is to teach English not as direct teaching, but to make a funny programme, an enjoyable programme to watch, that is in fact very carefully structured so that each programme brings out a different point in English.
Graham Turner: So that kind of work brought him to a wider public audience. Even if people weren't really understanding what the nature of the work that he was doing was, they were seeing sign language as a natural part of the linguistic landscape of the UK.
Matthew Bannister: I believe Peter was also involved in interpreting dramas, plays by authors like Shakespeare.
Graham Turner: By the end of the 1990s, he'd established a particular reputation for his, work in the theatre, and especially his interpreting of Shakespeare plays. Bear in mind, if you've ever stood in a theatre with a sign language interpreter, you may well have seen them working as a single person standing on the corner of a stage playing all the parts and doing that simultaneously alongside the actors speaking in English.
ARCHIVE: 1998 Spotlight BBC World Service
Peter Llewellyn-Jones: If it's a very complicated text, something like a Shakespeare or a Renaissance play, then I would read it, obviously, and read all the notes and the commentaries and one thing and the other to make sure I understand it. But usually it's sufficient to see a play once, maybe twice, get the feel of it, and then actually on the night do a spontaneous interpretation. And it has to be like that, because I think that's what deaf people are buying the tickets to see. They're buying the tickets to see those actors do the play on that night, warts and all. And so my job is to interpret exactly what's going on that stage.
Graham Turner: I'm told that, he eventually completed the entire set of Shakespeare's works.
Matthew Bannister: And was there a unique Peter style of interpreting? I mean, like an accent
Graham Turner: That's a very good question. Part of the job is to reflect the speakers and signers that they're working with. So they have to be somewhat of a chameleon. And again, Peter's acting skills will have come in very useful there.
At the same time, of course, there's gonna be an element of one's own style and one's own physicality, about the output that you produce as an interpreter.
Peter Llewellyn-Jones: There's always this great ideal that the interpreter should be absolutely one hundred percent impartial, neutral. In reality, that's impossible.
You know, we're all people. And if you just look at the way that we understand language, you know, in cognitive terms, we put our own meaning onto what is being said. So every time we listen to somebody talking, we are interpreting that for ourselves anyway.
Graham Turner: Pete couldn't stop himself being entertaining.
He was a natural raconteur. He never was afraid of a little mild embellishment for dramatic effect, and his students couldn't get too much of that. One person referred to him as funny, clever, and just a lovely guy who believed in us all. I think that says it all really.
Matthew Bannister: Graham Turner on Peter Llewellyn Jones, who's died aged seventy-six.
Thanks again to Rachel for getting in touch. And if you know of someone who's died recently who had a remarkable life, we'd love to hear from you. Just send us an email with some information about them to lastword@bbc.co.uk.
