The Poetry of Larkin by Philip Larkin
"The Poetry of Larkin" examines the work of British poet Philip Larkin, highlighting his position within the landscape of contemporary English poetry. Larkin is often associated with the literary movement known as "The Movement," which emerged in the 1950s and sought to reflect the realities of middle-class life and societal change through straightforward language. His poetry is marked by a focus on authenticity, human experience, and a candid portrayal of the mundane aspects of life, drawing inspiration from earlier poets like Wordsworth and Hardy.
Larkin’s notable works, such as "The Less Deceived" and "The Whitsun Weddings," showcase his mastery of form and structure while offering a contemplative perspective on themes like nostalgia, irony, and the passage of time. His poems often blend colloquial tones with intricate rhythmic variations, inviting readers to engage with both the imagery and the underlying commentary on existence. While Larkin's early work presents a clear-eyed view of human conditions, his later poetry reflects a more somber, critical stance on life's futility, raising questions about the meaning and significance of everyday experiences. Overall, Larkin's poetry stands as a significant contribution to post-war English literature, resonating with readers who appreciate its blend of honesty and artistry.
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The Poetry of Larkin by Philip Larkin
First published:THE NORTH SHIP, 1945; POEMS, 1954; THE LESS DECEIVED, 1955; THE WHITSUN WEDDINGS, 1964
Critical Evaluation:
Where does the mainstream of English poetry lie? Admirers of the contemporary British poet, Philip Larkin, see its source to be Wordsworth, its exponents Thomas Hardy and Edward Thomas, those quiet introverted men who refused to follow any but their own individual bent. It is a stream that moves underground when intensely classical or romantic spirits are abroad—an Eliot or a Dylan Thomas—but which is encouraged into the light by the ironic, contemplative aura of the later Auden. It was in the early 1950’s that “The Movement” declared itself again, in Robert Conquest’s anthology, NEW LINES; and the British public revealed itself as ready for Wordsworth’s “real language of men.” Novelists and poets began to take a hard look at changing social patterns: at middle class mentality, suburban mediocrity, the uncaring anonymity of “I’m all right, Jack.” It was a world shorn of metaphor and myth whose poets almost desperately declared themselves as humanists, dedicated to the revelation of “the real person or event.” Honesty or the awareness of honesty was their religion.
Philip Larkin was one of the first, along with Kingsley Amis and John Wain, to reflect the new attitudes. He had started off at the beginning of the war as a promising young novelist. His first novel, JILL, was published in 1940, when he was twenty-one. It depicts the struggles of a scholarship boy thrust into the upper class world of Oxford and resolving his problems through fantasy. However, Larkin’s 1955 book of poems, THE LESS DECEIVED, indicated that he had stripped himself of the dream and was forcing himself to become at home in a world essentially alien to the dreamer. He was seeking a way to deal with things as they are, not as they seem; without distortion. Possibly for this reason the first poem in the book, and one that has been much anthologized, is most revealing of his approach and method. It is titled “Lines on a Young Lady’s Photograph Album.”
With its evocation of a real girl in a real place this poem sets the colloquial, self-mocking tone reminiscent of Hardy’s ballads or of Meredith’s lyrics. The structure, too, of this poem is as complicated and controlled as Hardy’s: a loose iambic stanza of five lines with a consistent rhyme scheme, yet contemporary in its use of half-rhymes and assonances.
In his poem, Larkin is not satisfied merely to record, to photograph, even though he can flick out the exact word to create a picture. He can do more by commenting on the scene and involving the listener in his commentary. A purely “imagist” poet would be content to leave the picture objectively before us, implying only its emotional direction. But Larkin plunges right into exposition, and he goes over the scene again, peeling away leaf after leaf to reveal the frustration.
“Lines on a Young Lady’s Photograph Album” reveals his control over his vehicle which is a characteristic of all of Larkin’s work. He is an intent craftsman, creating within a set form an amazing variety of rhythmic variations. And he is steadily concerned with the evocative power of assonance and alliteration. This poem is aptly illustrative of Larkin’s nostalgic, ironic mood; of his reasonable acceptance of an unsatisfactory world; and of his angst which never becomes self-pity. There is, in his best work, a stoicism which keeps the artist apart from the crowd yet not superior to it, as in “Reasons for Attendance” when he looks through a ballroom window at the jiving dancers.
Integrity and honesty are the keynotes in Philip Larkin’s volume of poems titled THE WHITSUN WEDDINGS. Here he is willing himself to identify more closely with other men, other houses, other streets and communities. Many of the poems are less introverted, consisting of more objective recording and less private comment. The result is lively, as a newspaper is lively; but one wonders whether the poems in this volume may not be more ephemeral, concrete though they appear. The colloquial tone makes them highly topical, but the sense of timelessness so strong in THE LESS DECEIVED is somehow missing. Throughout all these later poems it is remarkable to note how often the last line, which in THE LESS DECEIVED was often a tour de force of strength and confidence, has become wearily negative.
The title poem, “The Whitsun Weddings,” is the longest and most ambitious. In all eight stanzas the iambic pentameter is skillfully handled; the structure, even the rhymes, seem as natural as everyday speech. Inevitably the tone brings to mind a trenchant, detached observer of the noisy wedding parties: the loud-voiced mothers, an uncle mouthing smut, genteel dress, cheap jewelry. The poem expresses a desperate sense of time spent uselessly. At the end it is no longer merely ironic; it has become a bitter commentary on the meaningless in life. “No exit” faces the poet. Is it that Philip Larkin, who began by assuming a steady unflinching view of the human condition, is now disturbed or terrified by the spectacle of humanity’s nakedness? The world that had seemed so interestingly photogenic now forces him to examine its flesh and blood.