Philip Larkin. The Silent Herald E-Book

Puja Chakraberty

• Herausgeber: GRIN Verlag
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014

Beschreibung

Academic Paper from the year 2014 in the subject Didactics for the subject English - Literature, Works, Ranchi University , language: English, abstract: Percy Bysshe Shelley once said, “Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world”. To Shelley, a poet was a sort of a prophet, a foreseer, a foreboder, a minister who administrated the deepest truths and was next only to God. Reverting from this transcendence, Wordsworth looked upon the poet as “a man speaking to men” and not some superhuman creature, one whose emotions and feelings were in no way different from those of ordinary men and women. To level the fact more plainly, Philip Larkin was all that and a little more. He himself once said about his poems, that they should give his readers the feeling of “a chap chatting to chaps”. The present essay endeavours to show Philip Larkin as a distant yet sympathetic observer of various aspects of life.

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Philip Larkin: The Silent Herald

References

Philip Larkin: The Silent Herald

Percy Bysshe Shelley once said, “Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world”. To Shelley, a poet was a sort of a prophet, a foreseer, a foreboder, a minister who administrated the deepest truths and was next only to God. Reverting from this transcendence, Wordsworth looked upon the poet as “a man speaking to men” and not some superhuman creature, one whose emotions and feelings were in no way different from those of ordinary men and women. To level the fact more plainly, Philip Larkin was all that and a little more. He himself once said about his poems, that they should give his readers the feeling of “a chap chatting to chaps”. The present essay endeavours to show Philip Larkin as a distant yet sympathetic observer of various aspects of life.

“BEHOLD her, single in the field,

Yon solitary highland lass!

Reaping and singing by herself;

Stop here, or gently pass!”

(The Solitary Reaper)

This was Wordsworth’s take on the bewitching beauty that he occasioned and captured with absorbing senses. Larkin, however, was of the opposite kind.

“Never such innocence,

Never before or since

As changed itself to past

Without a word—the men

Leaving the gardens tidy,

The thousands of marriages

Lasting a little while longer:

Never such innocence again.”

(MCMXIV)

Being an anti-Romantic himself, Larkin clearly perceived life as a bag full of gifts and burdens and not the ideal glistening bottle-ship removed from all perils and disasters. For a start, consider the poem, ‘At Grass’:

“The eye can hardly pick them out

From the cold shade they shelter in,

Till wind distresses tail and mane;

Then one crops grass, and moves about

The other seeming to look on-

And stands anonymous again.”

The poem is about two retired racehorses who once enjoyed wide reputation and glory in their prime, but are now reduced to anonymity and oblivion. The speaker notices that, these horses who were previously cared and dotted upon for their famed positions and the money they brought in, were now left in a neglected and dishevelled state. And that one could hardly distinguish them now in the meadows, where they tread and sometimes gallop. But the speaker suggests, that the horses are now happy (probably because they are now free of the daily toil and drudgery), and the thoughts of “stardom”, so as to imply, do not annoy them like flies. The poem is extremely meaningful and significant, as it bears deep connotations and parallels with human life. Even the common man incessantly works for a living, whether he likes it or not, and finally languishes into a state of neglect and forgetfulness.

In the poem ‘Wires’, the speaker relates that young steers or calves frequently stray into the wide prairie lands in search of purer, sweeter water, ignorant of the fact that they are electrically fenced. But their innocence is marred, once they are caught in the fences, which give no farthing to their pain and torment. The speaker says that, the young steers from that moment become old cattle, as they tend to realize their limits and never stray again. These limits, bounds, fences or wires, the speaker seems to imply, are the grimmest aspects of life from which there is no escape nor evasion.

In the poem ‘Toads’ and ‘Toads Revisited’, the speaker voices an almost common question- the drudgery of everyday life. In every sphere of life, man has to work in order to earn a living. Quite normally, not everyone likes the job, but he has to make do. The speaker calls this, “the toad work” and looks upon it as an essential evil that needs to be pitched out. Here, one needs to remember that Larkin himself disliked his job as a librarian. He considered it dull and distasteful, as he confessed it to his friend Monica Jones. This work is more the work of a mercenary drudge. The speaker admits:

“Its hunkers are heavy as hard luck,

And cold as snow,

And will never allow me to blarney

My way of getting

The fame and the girl and the money

All at one sitting.”

Then again, the thought of being like everyone else- gay and merry, whereas somewhere else sceptical and brooding makes him shrug off the idea. What once was looked upon as a potential dread, now turns into a consolation. “If you cannot beat it, join it”. Thus, the spirit of rebellion seemingly loosens its earlier stance and, comparatively ends on a docile note:

“When the lights come on at four

At the end of another year?

Give me your arm, old toad;

Help me down Cemetery Road.”

In ‘The Whitsun Weddings’, the speaker relates a train journey to London, about how he was getting late one Whitsun Saturday. The poem is more like a cinematic representation describing people, places, sights, sounds and smells. The elaboration of the whole situation is so enjoyable and gripping, that it makes one sit up and watch what’s going to happen next. It is like one can actually touch the pulse of the poem (as if it were a living being) and feel it throbbing. The imagery is candidly splendid and ever charming. The speaker describes nearly everything around him- the fish smelling docks, the meadows, the cattle, the cannals floating with industrial discharges. Because it’s a very hot day, he doesn’t care to observe the happenings at each station, where the train pauses for a while “sun destroys the interest of what’s happening in the shade”. Later, he happens to catch a glimpse of one of the wedding parties and is amused by the sight of a line of fashionably dressed girls standing and waving good-bye to the couple. Their overwhelming liveliness and joy catches his attention, so that he resolves to watch the whole happenings (that of the Whitsun Weddings) at the next station. But very soon, he is disappointed to come across a whole new vision:

“The women shared

The secret like a happy funeral;

While girls, gripping their handbags tighter stared,

At a religious wounding.”

After all the drama and commotion, the couple is at last free to have that private moment themselves. They sit side by side, gazing the rural landscape, never for a moment thinking of the people they would never meet or how this time is going to contain their lives. This time being the only time celebrating the beauty and joy of togetherness and being in love. The young couple must be pondering over the new lives and the new places they are to inhabit and dwell in. But the speaker is more concerned of the outcome. As the train makes a shift from the rural to the urban side, the speaker is almost ready to get over “this frail coincidence”. Again, he thinks of the impending destiny that awaits the newly-weds. As the train comes to a halt, it is like the end of a sweet dream and the beginning of bland reality, as he takes stock of the whole situation by presenting a poignant simile:

“Like an arrow shower; sent out of sight somewhere becoming rain.”

The rain should have descended in London, instead it is showering elsewhere. Cupid’s arrows are shown in contrast with the real arrows of battlefield, directed and fired against love itself, suggesting thereby a constant war going on between good and evil (here evil implies the sinister or flip side of human nature).

In the poem ‘Lines On A Young Lady’s Photograph Album’, the speaker examines the pitch-perfect permanence of a photograph as against temporal youth and its transitoriness. A young lady’s photograph album evokes in him emotions, that are not sentimental but practical. He acknowledges the art’s “faithfulness” for its truthful depiction of events as they are. At the same time, he expresses undue “disappointment” as it displays “dull days as dull” and fails to evoke the past, which as depicted in the photograph looks all beautiful and flowery. All this leave him only to sigh and regret over the lady’s present contemplating, “no matter whose your future”. Apparently the qualities of her past have deserted her now, and the speaker suggests that the photograph album under such circumstances can provide no embalming consolation.

In ‘The Building’, presumably a hospital, the speaker reflects upon the fragility of human life, weighing its limited options. He begins by describing the whole scene around him. The building is not a cheerful place to be in, like a movie-theatre or a clubhouse. The “porters” walking around are “scruffy” and grumbling. In the steel chairs, the men and women are uneasy, even though they show themselves to be resigned and uncomplaining. Even the “creepers” of a nearby plant reek an unpleasant smell. Every now and then, a nurse arrives and beckons someone to come with her inside the room. When someone is wheeled past, brief glances are shared and nothing spoken. The speaker determines this as the common plight of all people, who are also destined towards a common end, which is why they keep to themselves. This “new thing” is hard to cope with for anybody and is better left unresolved. Then, he looks at the world outside: a man walking by towards the parking lot all free, “short terraced streets”, a locked church, the traffic beyond, and some children playing in the streets unhindered. He muses at the infinite possibilities, opportunities and loves surrounding the people outside this “building”, which are nowhere near the grasp of these unfortunate people dwelling here. The speaker makes an important observation here. He calls this “happy-go-lucky” thought as a pleasantly charming dubious dream to which, “all are lulled but wake from separately”, only to end up in these corridors.

In ‘Essential Beauty’ and ‘Sunny Prestatyn’, the speaker voices the rising menace of materialism and its crude manifestation in the hunger for mass consumerism in the middle class culture “A cultural revolution” had surfaced in Great Britain in the 60s (Neumann), which Larkin found difficult to overlook in totality.

“[…] but greeds

And garbage are too thick-strewn

To be swept up now, or invent

Excuses that make them all needs

I just think it will happen soon.”

(Going, Going)

In the above lines, the speaker assumes the role of a prophet and forsees the future wherein the countryside shall be sold off, with the auctioneers crying “going, going”. Here, he laments over the increasing mobility dominating the quiet landscape, whereas the roads remaining forever primitive and untouched by modernization. This is a frightening view, suggested by Larkin. Moving at a fast pace, England seems to have undermined its cultures and ideals. A number of potent events marked this change. To name a few, British imperialism suffered a setback, inflation enjoyed the upper hand, the Welfare State and all its previous goals and ideals had gone awry and totally malfunctional. More importantly, middle-class ideals concerning language, education and religion went topsy-turvy. All this has to be kept in mind, while approaching these poems of Larkin. They are more like “period pieces” documenting social, political and economic changes of the time. In ‘Essential Beauty’, the speaker mocks at fanciful hoardings, promising false hopes and unattainable dreams to the ordinary human.

“High above the gutter

A silver knife sinks into golden butter,

A glass of milk stands in a meadow, and

Well-balanced families, in fine

Midsummer weather, owe their smiles, their cars,

Even their youth, to that small cube each hand

Stretches towards.”

He also speaks of grave-yards being “screened” with “custards” and slums being covered up with rampant exaltation of “motor oil” and “cuts of salmon”, hinting poignantly that such high-end thinking and lack of “Englishness” for an economy “welled-up” in mud only proves to be ludicrous and reprehensible.

In ‘Sunny Prestatyn’, there is a lot of sexual politics involved together with a general scorn against the firebrand of consumerism (Edward Reiss). A skimpily clothed woman kneeling in an erotic position is enticing its viewers to come for a beach holiday in Prestatyn, which is shown to be bright and sunny. In reality, Prestatyn being a place in the East Middlands is characterized for its cloudy weather, meaning the whole base of the advertisement is clad in untruth and falsehood. The speaker continues, then “one day in March she was slapped up”, not disfigured or despoiled. Note the forceful endowment “slapped up”, as if the speaker relishes conferring the epithet. Then a string of adverbs and epithets are applied that suggest his support of the act on behalf of the boys, who apparently enjoyed annihilating the image. The hoarding with this poster invites viewers with the fraudulent promise of an earthly paradise combined with erotic pleasure and comfort. Thus, the autograph in the form of “tuberous cocks and balls” is aptly justified. The image of the seductive woman is both “exploited and exploitative” (Sisir Kumar Chatterjee). Her presence in the form of an alluring figure is exploited by the advertisement organisers for monetary gains. She in her turn, exploits and provokes the erotic fantasies of the opposite sex. The woman in the poster promises fulfilment and satisfaction, whereas in truth, the viewers are met with disappointment and “deprivation”. This frustration vents itself in “disfiguring” and “raping” the image in its own way. The masculine gender thus relishes in overpowering the nightingale (Eliot), who uses sex as a weapon and is a probable threat to their consciousness. The second and adjoining poster announcing “Fight Cancer” appears to be a “counter-invite” to the first one. Sexual fulfilment like immortality is as impossible and unattainable a dream as the other. Thus, the speaker appears to warn readers against such evils (lures of enchantment and illusion), which is being bred and is germinating in the society like cancers, and that this needs to be checked and prevented. The final message of the poem is a positive one, as the speaker refuses to submit against the odds of life.

In ‘Homage To A Government’, the speaker views the recurrent economic crisis, which engulfed England during 1964-67 from his own quintessential angle. He perceives it in terms of the brewing greed and selfishness that marked the present day post-war government. He says, “next year”, “we” shall be bringing home soldiers for lack of money. Money, which is being considered the primary necessity, the fundamental priority above basic morals and principles. The speaker again says, “next year”, “we” shall be living in a countryside with its statues and regular embellishments all present, except the “children” will not know it’s a “different country” as compared to a full thriving and ebullient town. “All we can hope to leave them now is money” again facilitates the potency and at the same time, contempt over the issue of “money”, which also plays a key role in ‘Going, Going’ with the speaker’s palpable fear of even the countryside being sold off, thus alluding England being governed by “crooks and tarts” (crooks meaning politicians and tarts as economists), who are busy “filling in” (the vacuum caused by money) rather than providing and refurbishing. It is important to note that only the aristocratic class remained untouched by the then economic condition, while the lower and middle class suffered all the same, with some of them reaching the end of the tether.

In ‘The Church Going’, the speaker besets upon a church intrigued by its seriousness and solidarity. He later rues his decision as the place offers nothing new and amusing to him. He describes the church with its mats, chairs and stones, some brass figurines and decaying flowers. Then he goes over some religious verses, which too bore him, until he finally announces “And here endeth” with sufficient force and relief. The speaker then ponders over the potential of such a Herculean structure and its exhaustiveness. He wilfully muses over the future of such a place when it is no longer frequented by the people. Probably some of the cathedrals will be put on display by historians and chroniclers, for its archaic value and a reminder of the past. The rest shall generously be devoted for shelter of sheep and decaying wrought by natural forces of nature, mainly rain. Some woman might bring her child for touching a stone sacred to her. Some “ruin bibber” picking up the shreds of what has been left behind, some antiquarian who loves to collect old things or some “Christmas addict” trying to pin his faith on whatever he sees. Then, he pauses and reflects that the church, which serves as an indispensable link between past and present can never run into oblivion, because it records and distinguishes every aspect of human life like marriage, birth and death with solemn grace and dignity. Thus, the availability and potentiality of the church remain unrefuted.

In ‘The Old Fools’, the speaker examines the question of old age with child-like persistence and perseverance. “I grow old, I grow old, I shall wear the flannels of my trousers rolled” (The Love Song Of J. Alfred Prufrock). The whole poem seems to echo this mood of nonchalant melancholy, self-pity and dismal hope. The speaker wonders whether old people consider “old age” as a sign of maturity, as if they had been living with a drooling mouth, wrinkled skin and pruned face their whole lives. About “pissing” all the time and never remembering who they meet each day. He assumes that perhaps they have lighted rooms inside their head with known people (he can’t remember now) doing everyday regular things like, setting a lamp or removing a book from a bookshelf, or do they simply sit and gaze the empty room with its regular features, the bush outside or some motioning rain drizzle on a midsummer evening. It is as if they tirelessly attempt to put together “the million-petalled flower” trying to be “there”, when they are actually “here”, and their absent looks can be traced to the fact of their attempting vigorously to be both here and there (a region or state, which lie remotely beyond their reach).This not knowing how, when and who is quite a bewildering phenomenon for the speaker, which sends him into a tizzy. Then, he philosophically reflects that the mountain called death, which always lie in “our view” is rising ground for them. Even though, they may not be able to distinguish the nature and timing of one’s death, its eventuality remains fixed and unhindered.

In the preceding years following Larkin’s death, his popularity has not just doubled and tripled, but quadrupled. People came infinitely to identify with the subtle emotions of this reclusive poet. His ideas and thoughts promisingly scattered in a handful of his poems have been read, reread, interpreted and reinterpreted a number of times, with many of them comparing him to the Romantics, the Augustans and even the Moderns. Even as research continues to this date on his poetry, the list grows endless. It did not take long for scholars to discover a rampant genius lurking behind the veil of a humble librarian. Larkin received many honours in his day, including the prestigious Queen’s Medal for poetry. Though he modestly refused the Poet Laureateship, he undoubtedly came to be regarded as the unofficial Poet Laureate of England.

Scholars duly recognized that behind that thick lens, this good man perceived a great many things, which others seemed to have neglected or missed out. These were the simple joys and sorrows, daily life, men and women and life and times. In a way, he laid down a precedent for lucid writing, uncomplicated subject matters and the poet-reader relationship. His objective observation and critical acumen catapulted him to unmatched glory. Larkinism and Larkinesque came to be identified and worshipped, with such phrases “innate assumptions”, “never such innocence again” fastening to the mind of the reader. Larkin created the ordinary out of the extraordinary and the extraordinary out of the ordinary. It is this genius of his craftsmanship and himself that shall forever endear and appeal him to his readers.

References

Chatterjee, Sisir Kumar. (2006). Philip Larkin: Poetry That Builds Bridges. Delhi: Nice Printing Press.

Larkin Philip. (2004). Philip Larkin-Poems-Classic Poetry Series. (Online) Available: seas3.elte.hu/coursematerial/FerenczGyozo/Philip_larkin.pdf,

Neumann, Fritz-Wilhelm. (2003). "The Poet of Political Incorrectness: Larkin's Satirical Stance on the Sexual-Cultural Revolution of the 1960s."EESE4.

Reiss, Edward. (1999). "Poetry and Prejudice: Sexual Politics in 'Sunny Prestatyn.'"About Larkin 7.

Shelley, Percy Bysshe. (1840). A Defence of Poetry. (Online) Available: www.bartleby.com>…>EnglishEssays:SidneytoMacaulay