Philip Larkin
Philip Larkin
Philip Arthur Larkin CH CBE FRSLwas an English poet, novelist and librarian. His first book of poetry, The North Ship, was published in 1945, followed by two novels, Jilland A Girl in Winter, and he came to prominence in 1955 with the publication of his second collection of poems, The Less Deceived, followed by The Whitsun Weddingsand High Windows. He contributed to The Daily Telegraph as its jazz critic from 1961 to 1971, articles gathered in All What Jazz: A...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth9 August 1922
sex people overcoming
SEX is designed for people who like overcoming obstacles.
wisdom people giving
Most people know more as they get older: I give all that the cold shoulder.
people poetry about-yourself
Novels are about other people and poems are about yourself
believe guiding-principles people
As a guiding principle I believe that every poem must be its own sole freshly created universe, and therefore have no belief n 'tradition' or a common myth-kitty or casual allusions in poems to other poems or poets, which last I find unpleasantly like the talk of literary understrappers letting you see they know the right people.
writing thinking people
I think writing about unhappiness is probably the source of my popularity, if I have any - after all, most people are unhappy, don't you think?
always-trying people feels
I am always trying to 'preserve' things by getting other people to read what I have written, and feel what I felt.
thinking people pubs
I'd like to think...that people in pubs would talk about my poems
beginning classic far formula
Far too many relied on the classic formula of a beginning, a muddle, and an end
late nineteen rather sexual
Sexual intercourse beganin nineteen sixty-three(Which was rather late for me)between the end of the Chatterley banand the Beatles' first LP.
squat toad work
Why should I let the toad work / Squat on my life?
dream luck pass wake
I dream about that sometimes-and wake up screaming. With any luck they'll pass me over.
reading giving thrill
Give me a thrill, says the reader, Give me a kick; I don't care how you succeed, or What subject you pick.
drinking giving musical
The chromatic scale is what you use to give the effect of drinking a quinine martini and having an enema simultaneously.
sex mean moments
Sex means nothing--just the moment of ecstasy, that flares and dies in minutes.