Synopses & Reviews
This book explores Larkin's distinctive place within the poetry of the twentieth century. It includes discussion of Larkin's response to the academic professionalization of poetry fostered by "difficult" Modernism; his diverse poetry of love (in relation to the responses of the poems' addressees); his original development of the genres of reflective elegy and self-elegy; the key metaphor of the domestic interior; history versus historicism; the poetry of place ("here" or Hull); and the profane and sacred (focusing on his animal poems).
Synopsis
James Booth reads Philip Larkin's mature poetry in terms of his ambiguous self-image as lonely, anti-social outsider, plighted to his art, and as nine-to-five librarian, sharing the common plight of humanity. Booth's focus is on Larkin's artistry with words, the 'verbal devices' through which this purest of lyric poets celebrates 'the experience. The beauty.' Featuring discussion for the first time of two recently discovered poems by Larkin, this original and exciting new study will be of interest to all students, scholars and enthusiasts of Larkin.
Synopsis
Acknowledgements Abbreviations The Poet's Plight Poetry as a Living Loves and Muses I Loves and Muses II Poetic Histories Living Rooms Empty Gestures Appendix Notes Bibliography Index
About the Author
James Booth is Professor of English at the University of Hull and General Editor of
The Larkin Society Monograph Series and Editor of
The Larkin Society Journal.
Table of Contents
Introduction * Poetry as a Living * Eliot, Larkin and Modernity * Intimacies * Empty Gestures * Rooms * Poetic Histories * Larkin, Heaney and the Poetry of Place * Profane and Sacred in Larkin and Hughes * Index