“To remember is to dream. There are ghosts in these pages, and this story is largely a tale of spirits who have continued to touch me in dreams as they once did in life.” So begins the epigraph to Dai Smith’s Off The Track.

A formidable historian, academic and stalwart of the Welsh literary scene for decades, Smith is a trustworthy guide through his own memory: first growing up in Tonypandy in the mid-Rhondda before moving to Barry as a boy, but also the history of Welsh mining history, Welsh Labour and socialism – the history of the man and the history of the country seemingly inseparable.

Off The Track’s 400 pages is densely packed with facts, tales of the writer’s life, and the hauntings of old friends who died before their time. At times it is incredibly moving, other times perhaps a slog for a newcomer to the Dai Smith catalogue. While reeling off every single treat Smith may have at his parents’ dinner table was a particular delight, the minute detail of subjects Smith studied at Oxford and Columbia universities, as well as never-ending passages of rugby matches in the 1960s and 70s, seem to challenge the reader to not skim through them.

Regardless, every page is packed with beautiful writing, and Smith harnesses his intimidating prowess as a writer to make public the archive of his own personal memory.