Does anyone know what happened to Philip Larkin in his mid-twenties to sour him to such an extent on the age-bracket? His poem "On Being Twenty-Six" uses both "putrescently" (an adverb so obscure that blogspot declines to recognize it) and "putrid." I remember the moment when I realized, with a sensation of falling swiftly, that I could no longer say I had "just graduated" from college. The very young are perhaps always shocked by the notion that they may one day become merely...young.
But I don't know yet what to make of this poem...my outlook is certainly not so glum as his and I can't imagine that a mere age -- and a pretty decent age at that -- could bring on such a flood of desolate imagery.
Any Larkin experts want to weigh in with biographical or textual insights?
2 comments:
Hi,
I found this essay online that you might have seen. The last paragraph has a reference to "On Being Twenty-six" and it was helpful for me. It seems, upon reading this essay, that he was not given to writing happy stuff ! At least not directly. So, If I may, a poem by Larkin on being in twenties had to be this way, maybe ? :D
But the withdrawal of felicity if not talent is certainly true and capable enough to give rise to sourness almost.
But he also shows, probably more for himself than anybody else, how there's hope in all this glumness - "the worst/
May scatter equally upon a touch"
Cheers !
Narimus
Hi Narimus,
Thank you for this comment! I don't actually know the essay you're referring to, though -- could you point me to it?
Thanks,
The Bunny
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