Introduction
Philip Larkin is an English poet, novelist and historian. He was born in 1922 and breathed his last in 1985. His stature as a poet is a debatable question as many critics are fond of finding faults in the poetic compositions of Larkin. However, there are also a host of critics who come and defend Larkin as a great poet. The subject of his poetry is the social and political effects of the great wars on England.
A Movement Poet
Larkin is considered to be a great Movement poet. Movement poets was a group of poets whose subject matter of poetry was to sketch up the dull, drab and sordid picture of the humanity after World War Second. B. R. Mullick, in his book A New History of English Literature, asserts that Larkin has the genius of both Robert Frost and Thomas Hardy. How? His poems are as short as the ones by Frost and as sceptic as the works of Hardy. Despite the hidden morbidity in his poems, Larkin does appreciate the little offerings of life.
Prominent Themes
The poetry of Larkin is known by a handful of the selection of themes. Some notable themes of his poems may include like death, melancholy, time, isolation, love, war and religion. The theme of melancholy is the most dominant theme in his poetry, mostly motivated by pessimism. The theme of death comes as an outcome of the theme of pessimistic melancholy which is very obvious in his poem 1914 in which soldiers literally sign themselves up for death. Time, according to him, is a force that uses its influence to destroy the mortal men and their important places, as suggested in the ruins of a church in Church Going. Isolation is the main problem in this crowded modern life as is obvious in Mr. Bleaney. He considers love an illusion. While he thinks religion will decay with the passage of time as humanity progresses but he finds spirituality promising.
Opinion of Critics
Due to the sad and pessimistic outlook of Larkin, he is regarded as "the saddest heart in the post-war supermarket" by Eric Homberger. Larkin is often referred as "the reluctant poet of the drab and austere surfaces of post-war Britain". While his supporters see social realism and the acceptance of the actual but dismal condition of the post-war generation. His narrow selection of ideas was the main reason behind the groaning voices of critics against him. But as he published more collections of poetry like High Windows, the voices against his work seemed to fade away. The following comment appropriately sums up the whole discussion of criticism,
Regarded for much of his career as a minor poet with a narrow range of subject matter, Larkin now seems to dominate the history of English poetry in the second half of the (twentieth) century much as T.S. Eliot dominated it in the first. Though detractors continue to speak of his gloom, philistinism, insularity, and anti-modernism, the authority and grandiloquence of his long poems, and the grace, sharpness, or humour of his shorter ones now seem indisputable, as does his clear-eyed engagements with love, marriage, freedom, destiny, ageing, death, and other far from marginal subjects.
Conclusion
Thus, Larkin is a great poet of the second half of the twentieth century. Though at times, he may look pessimistic but he actually portrayed what was felt for real.
Sources and Suggested Readings
- A New History of English Literature by B. R. Mullick - Page 308
- Notes provided by Sir Saffi
- https://neoenglish.wordpress.com/2010/12/02/philip-larkin-as-a-poet/
