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A short class with Sarah and her students. The other ways are under More.
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Before we read 'The Whitsun Weddings' again, let us meet its author. Philip Larkin was born in Coventry in 1922 and studied English at St John's College, Oxford.
Is he the poet who worked in a library, sir?
Yes. He was a librarian all his working life, and from 1955 he ran the university library at Hull for about thirty years.
So he wrote poetry beside his job?
Exactly. Most of his mature poems, including the one we are studying, were written during those years in Hull.
Did he travel much?
He made regular train journeys, including trips between Hull and London, and a journey like that is at the heart of our poem.
In the 1950s a group of English writers, including Larkin and Kingsley Amis, was labelled the Movement. What do you think they wanted from poetry?
Poems that ordinary readers could understand?
Good. They preferred clear language, real subjects and a sensible, ironic tone to the difficult, allusive style of earlier modernist poets.
Is that why the train poem sounds almost like someone talking to us?
Yes. That conversational voice is Larkin's trademark, yet it sits inside tidy stanzas and a fixed rhyme scheme.
So it is plain on the surface but carefully built underneath.
Precisely, and that combination is worth praising in a critical appreciation.
My cousin says Larkin is a gloomy poet. Is that fair?
He is often called the poet of disappointment, but that is only half the story. His poems also show humour, compassion and sudden moments of hope.
Like the ending of this poem?
Yes. The closing image of 'The Whitsun Weddings' is one of the most hopeful moments in all his work, though it stays open-ended.
I read that his letters caused a controversy after he died.
True. The letters published in 1992 revealed some prejudiced private opinions. Readers now try to judge the poems by what they actually say and do, while being honest about the man.
born in Coventry in 1922, educated at Oxford, a librarian all his working life, University Librarian at Hull from 1955, and died in Hull in 1985.
Larkin wrote his mature poetry alongside a demanding career in libraries and lived most of his life alone, which gave him an outsider's point of view.
a 1950s group of English writers who favoured clear language, everyday subjects, irony and formal control.
his poems sound like thoughtful speech but are built with careful stanzas and rhyme, as in “The Whitsun Weddings”.
The North Ship (1945), The Less Deceived (1955), The Whitsun Weddings (1964) and High Windows (1974).
honoured and widely loved, yet debated because of the private opinions revealed after his death; the poems must be judged by what they say and do.
Linking life to poem: Larkin was an unmarried observer who travelled by train from Hull, and the speaker of “The Whitsun Weddings” is a lone passenger who watches other people's weddings from his seat.
The plain style at work: the poem's subject is a stopping train, station platforms and wedding parties, not gods or heroes, and it is told in a conversational voice inside a strict rhyme scheme.
A timeline answer: 1922 born in Coventry; 1943 first-class degree at Oxford; 1955 University Librarian at Hull; 1964 The Whitsun Weddings published; 1974 High Windows published; 1984 declines the Laureateship; 1985 dies in Hull.
A model opening sentence for an exam answer: Larkin, a Hull librarian and the leading poet of the Movement, uses the plain style and a strict stanza form in “The Whitsun Weddings” to turn an ordinary train journey into a quiet reflection on marriage and change.
Born in twenty-two in Coventry town, / Thirty years a Hull librarian, settled down; / Sixty-four, The Weddings made his name, / Eighty-five he died, but the poems remain.
Picture a quiet librarian in Hull who spends his days among shelves of books and his evenings shaping stanzas. He knows the train south to London well, and from such journeys he builds a poem about a hot holiday-weekend ride on which newly married couples climb aboard at one station after another. The poem helps to make him famous.
Three H's sum up Larkin's later life and work, Hardy as his guide, Hull as his home and High Windows as his last book.
L.A.R.K.I.N. - Librarian at Hull, Amis as his lifelong friend, Reserved observer, Key collection in 1964, Irony with tenderness, Never married
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When and where was Philip Larkin born, and when did he die?
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What was Larkin's main profession besides writing?
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What was the Movement?
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Which poet most influenced Larkin's mature style?
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Name Larkin's four main poetry collections and their dates.
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What did Larkin decide when he was offered the Poet Laureateship?
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A group of English writers of the 1950s, including Larkin and Kingsley Amis, whose work favoured clear language, everyday subjects, an ironic tone and traditional form.
A way of writing that uses ordinary, conversational words and direct statements instead of grand or decorative language.
The voice or character a writer creates to speak a poem, which may resemble the writer but is not the same as the writer.
The national poet of the United Kingdom, an honorary post given in the monarch's name; Larkin was offered it in 1984 and declined.
A published book of poems by one poet, such as The Whitsun Weddings (1964).
A way of writing in which the tone or surface meaning differs from the deeper meaning, often to suggest amusement, doubt or criticism.
Saying less than you mean, or saying something in a calm, low-key way, so that the feeling behind it is all the stronger.
A book that gathers poems or other writings by many authors, such as The Oxford Book of Twentieth Century English Verse, which Larkin edited.
Philip Larkin (1922–1985) was an English poet, novelist and university librarian, and the best-known poet of the post-war group called the Movement. His clear, carefully shaped poems about ordinary life, time, love and death, gathered in collections such as The Whitsun Weddings (1964), made him one of Britain's best-loved poets.
Born in Coventry in 1922, Philip Larkin studied English at St John's College, Oxford, where he began a lifelong friendship with the novelist Kingsley Amis. He then worked as a librarian for the rest of his life, and from 1955 he was University Librarian at Hull, a post he held for about thirty years. He never married and lived quietly in Hull, writing poetry alongside his demanding job. His collections The North Ship (1945), The Less Deceived (1955), The Whitsun Weddings (1964) and High Windows (1974) made him the leading voice of the Movement, a 1950s group that favoured plain language, formal control and everyday subjects. Larkin's poems combine dry humour and irony with unexpected tenderness, and they return again and again to time, disappointment, love and death. “The Whitsun Weddings”, the title poem of his 1964 collection, grew out of the kind of train journey he knew well, and it shows his gifts for close observation, a conversational voice and an open, hopeful ending. He declined the Poet Laureateship in 1984 and died in Hull in 1985.
This lesson introduces the poet so that you can read “The Whitsun Weddings” knowing something about the person who wrote it. It covers his life, his career, his place in English poetry, his style and his reputation, and then shows how all of this helps you read the poem.
Life at a glance
Early life and education
Larkin grew up in Coventry, the son of the city's treasurer, and was educated at King Henry VIII School before going up to Oxford. His poor eyesight kept him out of military service during the Second World War, so he was able to complete his degree. At Oxford his friendship with Kingsley Amis, who later wrote the comic novel Lucky Jim and dedicated it to him, sharpened his sense of humour. His love of jazz began early and lasted all his life.
A poet who was also a librarian
Larkin's working life was spent in libraries, not lecture halls. He served in a public library in Wellington and then in university libraries in Leicester, Belfast and Hull. At Hull he helped plan and run the Brynmor Jones Library, and most of his mature poetry was written during those Hull years. He never married, though he had long relationships, and he lived most of his life alone. This solitary, observant position, with one foot always outside the crowd, is also the position of the speaker in “The Whitsun Weddings”.
His works
The Movement and the plain style
In 1954 J. D. Scott, the literary editor of The Spectator, used the name the Movement for a group of English writers that included Larkin, Kingsley Amis, Donald Davie, D. J. Enright, John Wain, Elizabeth Jennings, Thom Gunn and Robert Conquest. Their best-known anthology, New Lines (1956), was edited by Conquest and included Larkin. Their writing shared a family likeness: clear, conversational language; subjects taken from ordinary English life; a down-to-earth, often ironic tone; and a liking for traditional form, with rhyme and stanza, over the difficult, allusive experiments of modernist poets. Larkin's early poems were influenced by Yeats and Auden, but from the early 1950s the plain, humane voice of Thomas Hardy mattered most to him. The result is poetry that sounds like intelligent speech yet is tightly built, as you can see from the eight ten-line stanzas and the fixed rhyme scheme of “The Whitsun Weddings”.
Themes and tone
Larkin writes about ordinary people and places: rented rooms, churches, railway stations, offices and hospitals. His recurring subjects are time and its passing, love and marriage, work, disappointment and the approach of death. He is often called the poet of disappointment, and many of his poems are bleak. The label is only half the truth, because there is humour, compassion and sudden hope in his work as well, and “The Whitsun Weddings” is one of the best examples.
Honours and reputation
The Whitsun Weddings cemented Larkin's reputation, and he soon became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. His honours include the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry and, later in life, the Companion of Honour. After the death of Sir John Betjeman in 1984 he was offered the post of Poet Laureate and declined it. In a 2003 survey by the Poetry Book Society he was chosen as Britain's best-loved poet of the previous fifty years, and in 2008 The Times named him Britain's greatest post-war writer. A bronze statue of him stands at Hull Paragon Interchange, the railway station from which the journey in the poem is generally taken to begin, and in 2016 a memorial stone was unveiled in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey.
A complicated legacy
After his death, the publication of his letters (1992) and of Andrew Motion's biography (1993) revealed private opinions, including racist and misogynistic remarks, that many readers found offensive. Critics have argued ever since about how far a poet's private views should affect the way we read his poems. Most readers now judge the poems by what they actually say and do, while staying honest about the man.
How the poet helps us read the poem
Using biography in your answers
A poem's speaker is a persona, a voice the poet creates, even when it resembles the poet. Use Larkin's life lightly: a sentence or two that explains a feature of the poem is worth more than a long biography. Always support a point with a precise reference to the poem, such as a stanza, an image or a technique, and put it in your own words.