I studied Larkin at school. He is a very good poet. But he's hard to admire as a man. Despite some sycophantic biographies since his death in 1985, there has always been a suspicion that he was a Thatcherite (which he was) and a racist. I read a book of his letters to his mistress, spanning 40 years, recently. What comes across is a small-minded, mean-spirited, tight-fisted hypochondriac who didn't have much time for other poets or poetry. In contrast to the finer feelings of his poetic persona as in this (out of season) poem, which is new to me.
The Trees
The trees are coming into leaf
Like something almost being said;
The recent buds relax and spread,
Their greenness is a kind of grief.
Is it that they are born again
And we grow old?
No, they die too,
Their yearly trick of looking new
Is written down in rings of grain.
Yet still the unresting castles thresh
In fullgrown thickness every May.
Last year is dead, they seem to say,
Begin afresh, afresh, afresh.
There are so many poets, artists, and other creative people who are very good at their "craft," but fail miserably as human beings, something I've become more aware of through my love of many poets/artists, some I know more personally. Many of our most beloved artists of all persuasions are tyrants in their personal lives, and/or lacking any real moral backbone. I'm never surprised anymore to find another name added to the list.
ReplyDeleteBut, this man does write some wonderful poetry. :)
Wonderful poetry indeed, Teresa. One of my tutors as a student of English was Philip Hobsbaum, also a poet who was an acquaintance of Larkin (Larkin disses him in his letters) and a mentor and tutor to Seamus Heaney at Queens University in Belfast. Hobsbaum was a bully and a coward. A really unpleasant man. But, strangely enough, he was a good teacher and a not bad poet as well.
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