Philip Larkin (Magill’s Literary Annual 1991-2005)
At a glance:
- Author: Andrew Motion
- First Published: 1993
- Type of Work: Literary biography
- Time of Work: 1922-1985
- Setting: Coventry, Oxford, Wellington, Leicester, and Hull, England; and Belfast, Ireland
- Principal Characters: Philip Arthur Larkin, Sydney Larkin, Eva Emilie Larkin, Kingsley Amis, Ruth Bowman, Monica Jones
- Genres: Nonfiction, Biography
- Subjects: Family or family life, Sexism, Poetry or poets, Libraries or librarians, Creative process, Weddings, Shyness
- Locales: England, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Can an interesting biography be written about such a man as Philip Larkin? He spent his working life as a librarian. He published four slim volumes of poetry, two short novels, and a fair number of critical essays and reviews. He seldom traveled and spent little time in London or, after his graduation, at Oxford or other major intellectual centers. He once facetiously described his hobby as “resting.” He never married and fathered no children. He lived quietly and unostentatiously in peripheral, if not provincial, academic communities such as University College, Leicester; Queen’s...
[The entire page is 2113 words long]
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