The primary purpose of this study is to present an appraisal of the major literary works of Emyr Humphreys, a pivotal figure in the life and culture of contemporary Wales. I explore the creative output of a writer chiefly known for his fiction and discuss the novels, poems, essays and plays produced down to the nineteen-nineties. The cultural philosophy underpinning the creative writings is examined with reference to Graham Greene, T.S. Eliot, Kate Roberts and, most significantly, Saunders Lewis. I trace the influence of these key figures on the ideology and creative practice of Humphreys. His work, I argue, occupies a unique place in the literature that emerged from Wales in the twentieth century by virtue of the way it reflects an informed, acutely observant mind whose engagement with moral issues results in fictional realism spanning the co-existent cultural and linguistic communities with modern Wales and drawing upon its English-language and Welsh-language traditions equally. I trace the phenomenon of struggle for artistic distinctiveness that motivates and characterises this writer's work and cultural activism. I suggest that the consciously European quality of Humphrey's ideology contributes to the idiosyncratic nature of his writing and accounts for his chosen role of custodian of his nation's memories through his creativity, his cultural crusading and his translation work. My thesis, therefore, aims to examine the range and quality of the literary works of Emyr Humphreys, the influences reflected in them and their significance for the study of twentieth-century culture.