Bibliography

Kuby, Lolette. "Bibliography." In An Uncommon Poet for the Common Man: A Study of Philip Larkin's Poetry, pp. 181-90. Paris: Mouton, 1974.

A detailed bibliography citing some of Larkin's lesser-known works.

Biography

Jacobson, Dan. "Profile 3: Philip Larkin." The New Review I, No. 3 (June 1974): 25-9.

A profile based on biographical questions, with some literary commentary.

Motion, Andrew. Philip Larkin: A Writer's Life. New York: Farrar, Straus Giroux, 1993, 570 p.

A teacher at Hull, literary executor to Larkin, and friend, the author states that the poet lived simply, "in the strictest sense, a writer's life," so that he could concentrate on his craft.

Criticism

Heaney, Seamus. "Now and in England." Critical Inquiry III, No. 3 (Spring 1977): 483-88.

Considers Larkin's language as "rational music," "rational light," comparing it to that of many of his English forebears.

Kissick, Gary. "They Turn on Larkin." The Antioch Review LII, No. 1 (Winter 1994): 64-70.

Explores "Larkin-bashing" in the wake of the publication of his letters and Andrew Motion's biography. Kissick cites Larkin's racism, misogyny, and "confused and morose" attitudes toward sex.

Kuby, Lolette. An Uncommon Poet for the Common Man: A Study of Philip Larkin's Poetry. Paris: Mouton, 1974, 190 p.

Comprehensive overview placing Larkin among his contemporaries.

Martin, Bruce. Philip Larkin. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1978, 166 p.

Approaches Larkin from two perspectives: American New Criticism and the British "men of letters."

Osterwalder, Hans. British Poetry between the Movement and Modernism: Anthony Thwaite and Philip Larkin. Heidelberg: Carl Winter, 1991, 299p.

Re-evaluates Larkin's work vis-a-vis his own antimodernist stance and the French symbolists.

Perloff, Marjorie. "What to Make of a Diminished Thing." Parnassus: Poetry in Review XIX, No. 2 (1994): 9-30.

Reviews Selected Letters of Philip Larkin and Philip Larkin, A Writer's Life, providing a less harsh appraisal of Larkin's right-wing tendencies than Kissick's article.

Phillips, Robert. "The Art of Poetry XXX." The Paris Review XXIV, No. 84 (Summer 1982): 45-72.

Interview in which Larkin speaks of his personal life and development as a writer.

Whalen, Terry. "Philip Larkin's Imagist Bias: His Poetry of Observation." Critical Quarterly XXIII, No. 2 (Summer 1981): 29-46.

Aligns Larkin with the Imagists as "a poet of sensation and impression."

Additional coverage of Larkin's life and career is contained in the following sources published by Gale Research: Concise Dictionary of British Literary Biography, 1960 to Present; Contemporary Authors, Vols. 5-8R, 117; Contemporary Authors New Revision Series, Vol. 24; Contemporary Literary Criticism, Vols. 3, 5, 8, 9, 13, 18, 33, 39, 64; Dictionary of Literary Biography, Vol. 27; DISCovering Authors: British; DISCovering Authors: Most-Studied Authors Module; DISCovering Authors: Poets Module; and Major Twentieth-Century Writers.