History Creator / PhilipLarkin

* StrawNihilist: A large proportion of his poetry seems to present this viewpoint; particularly notable is ''Aubade'', which is about the utter futility of life, given the inevitability of death.

* ADateWithRosiePalms: The narrator of "Love Again" speaks of "wanking at ten past three" while obsessing over his girlfriend or ex-girlfriend's date with another man.

* MeddlingParents: "This Be the Verse".

* DoubleMeaning: A famous example in "This Be the Verse," whose first line, "They fuck you up, your mum and dad," is about how parents raise their kids but also how they conceived their kids in the first place.

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Philip Arthur Larkin [[UsefulNotes/KnightFever CBE]] (9 August 1922 – 2 December 1985) was an English poet and occasional novelist. He was one of the leading poets in England starting with ''The Less Deceived'', released in 1955. His poems often contained soaring emotions involving life and death, but without going into [[{{Glurge}} cloying sentimentality]] or [[{{Wangst}} self-pity]].

An [[ReclusiveArtist intensely private]] man, Larkin worked as a librarian for decades at the University of Hull. He never married, but had a long-term relationship with Monica Jones, an English professor. He was offered, but declined, the position of British Poet Laureate a year before his death from cancer at age 63.

* MeddlingParents: In "This Be the Verse", from '' High Windows''.
* PrecisionFStrike: Again, "This Be the Verse". Also "High Windows".

* ''Aubade'' (1980)
* ''Collected Poems'' (1989)

* ''High Windows'' (1974)

* PrecisionFStrike: Again, "This Be the Verse".

* BettyAndVeronica: "Wild Oats" is about two girls, a beautiful "English Rose" who intimidates the narrator, and her bespectacled friend whom the narrator feels comfortable talking to and who becomes his fiancee for a time.

* BettyAndVeronica: "Wild Oats" is about two girls, a beautiful "English Rose" who intimidates the narrator, and her bespectacled friend whom the narrator feels comfortable talking to and who becomes his fiancee for a time

* TheAlcoholic: The speaker in ''Aubade''.

An [[ReclusiveArtist intensely private]] man, Larkin never married and worked as a librarian for decades at the University of Hull. He never married, but had a long-term relationship with Monica Jones, an English professor. He was offered, but declined, the position of British Poet Laureate a year before his death from cancer at age 63.

An [[ReclusiveArtist intensely private]] man, Larkin never married and worked as a librarian for the University of Hull. He was offered, but declined, the position of British Poet Laureate a year before his death from cancer at age 63.