I first saw the movie which was made from this book many,many years ago in 1942 and I read the story when I was in elementary school. The story takes place is in the years near the end of Queen Victoria's reign. Both the film and the book were based on the verities of real life in that period in Wales when the wealthy mine owners controlled the lives of men who had to go down into unsafe and filthy coal mines for little pay and great hazard. At that time "union" was a dirty word. Involvement with a union brought instant dismissal. This story tells of the courage of the men who mined and the women who waited for them to come up from the mine and home. The Morgan family of boys who contributed by handing their paltry pay packet to their mother who in turn rationed it out for food and then saved a bit for "the box" of family savings, While this is a tough story about hard times it is also a heart-warming story of men and women of faith who drew strength both from their own upbringing, their family, and those whom they loved. It is also the story of a young and intelligent boy in the family who could compete favorably for a scholarship which would educate him and whose parents could see him out of the mines and into a professional position.
There are also some despicable characters in the story: the sadistic teacher, Jason who although from a Welsh family in London, insisted on English spoken and merciless beat Huw, the young hero of the story. He got his own back when two professional boxers taught Huw (Roddy McDowell) to box and themselves gave the teacher a lesson; later Huw did the same thing; the despicable deacon (Barry Fitzgerald) who hounded a pathetic young girl who was pregnant without an acknowledged father; the snotty class-conscious owners and the son who nevertheless married the family's beautiful daughter (Maureen O'Hara. The good characters among whom were the minister new to the community (Walter Pidgeon) who was not so secretly in love with the Morgan daughter (played by Maureen O'Hara) who openly loved him. But this was not to be because he knew he could only offer her a life as the wife of religious poverty.
While the movie necessarily omits some subplots it does not suffer from these elisions required for a compact screenplay. But what it does provide, which for technical reasons the book must be silent on, is glorious renditions of Welsh choral harmony.
The final scene in both book and movie is guaranteed to move a heart of stone and wet every eye. This is probably one of the best books of its kind in the 20th Century, beautifully written with rich characterization and a plot that keeps on moving until the tragic ending. And the film was rich with Academy Award nominations and several Oscars.
I suggest you might want to read the book first, then view the movie. It is a classic you won't forget.
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