Ronald Stuart Thomas was born on 29 March 1913 in Cardiff, Glamorgan.  R. S. Thomas, was a Welsh poet and Anglican priest who was noted for his nationalism, spirituality and deep dislike of the anglicisation of Wales. He was the only child of Thomas Hubert and Margaret. The family moved to Holyhead in 1918 because of his father's work in theMerchant Navy. He was one of the major English language and European poets of the 20th century.

Thomas was educated in Wales at University College at Bangor (1935) and ordained in the Church of Wales (1936), in which he held appointments in several parishes. He published his first volume of poetry in 1946 and gradually developed his unadorned style with each new collection. His early poems, most notably those found in Stones of the Field (1946) and Song at the Year’s Turning: Poems 1942–1954 (1955), contained a harshly critical but increasingly compassionate view of the Welsh people and their stark homeland. In 1964 he won the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry. Thomas died on 25 September 2000, aged 87, at his home in Pentrefelin near Criccieth.