30 March 1958
Kensington
My dear old creature,
I am in a better humour now that the weather is warmer. The sun is shining in quite a balmy way, though I shouldn’t be surprised if there was some rain later on. I am staying in the Murphys’ flat in Kensington,1 but return to Hull this evening – I have been away for over a week!
Since coming to London I haven’t done much but go to Barkers & order an Anglepoise lamp for my flat. I hesitated a long time over other sorts, but decided in the end that I should be always bumping into any kind that stood on the floor, and might not like the feeling of it peering over my shoulder!
It’s a mistake to have too many things standing about.
My little talk – only about 15 mins – went uneventfully & seemed to provoke quite a lively discussion, though I had to think it all over carefully several times beforehand & work out how I was going to begin. We had a delicious dinner & altogether I liked Southampton very much. The Librarian once turned me down for a job there, & we talked this over with amusement: the person they did appoint – back in 1945 – has just died, poor woman. […]
There are crocuses in Hyde Park, but not much else, except foreigners. And not visitors, either – inhabitants! Scum of Europe, I kept thinking à la Sydney L. I suppose they are the staff of the embassies etc.
With all very best love,
Philip
1 The Irish poet Richard Murphy had married Patsy Strang in 1955. He was later the second Compton Poetry Fellow at Hull. See letters of 18 May and 14 September 1969.
2 April 1958
18 May 1958
My dear old creature,
[…] Tomorrow I have my last Committee of the year, which may prove a stormy one, as I am trying to get an increased grant for the Library, & money is very short. I expect I shall upset the Vice-Chancellor if I am not careful. Oh well. My building is getting more interesting: they have one whole section of the steel girders up now. I go and look at it every day, much to the amusement of the men, who offer to take me up on the crane-hook! I don’t think I shall accept the suggestion. They are an amusing lot. One said that the Clerk of Works disagreed with the way one v. high bit had been done, so he scrambled out along the girder & invited the C. of W. to come & have a look. The C. of W. declined, saying that he was keeping a wife & children: “ah doan’t know what he thought ah’m keeping!” They tell me that they have left all the bolts out in the part supporting my room. […]
I don’t expect you would hear Kingsley’s short programme of poetry on Thursday: he included a couple of mine, kindly.1 I haven’t heard any more from my publisher – I sent a letter gently expressing disinclination to finance his overdraft. Nor have I yet got my record, though it is promised, so I may be able to bring it home for Whitsun.2 You’ll be almightily bored with it, I expect. […]
Very best (I put vest!) love,
Philip
1 Eva reported on 20 May: ‘As it happens I did hear Kingsley’s programme last week. I was searching the Radio Times for something worth listening to, and noticed it. Kitty happened to call that day […] we both listened, and when he mentioned “a younger poet”, I knew who it was! / I very much liked the poem about the thrush and thought it worthy of Hardy. I am glad he chose “At Grass”, another favourite. Was it the first time it had been broadcast?’
2 A baffling reference. The Listen recording Philip Larkin reads ‘The Less Deceived’ was made five months later on 24 October 1958 at the HMV studios in London. (See letter of 7 December 1958.) Was an earlier recording date perhaps envisaged? Bloomfield, B. C.: Philip Larkin: A Bibliography 1933–1994 (London: British Library, 2002) lists no earlier recordings by Larkin himself.
8 June 1958
My dear old creature,
It looks a dull rainy Sunday outside, but this doesn’t greatly displease me as I have nothing especial to do, & anyway it looks as if it will clear up later. In fact the sun is coming out even as I write. I am lying on my sofa in the window & the record-player is playing.
About the most exciting thing of last week was photographing a graveyard! Last Sunday I took Monica for a short walk round a certain large deserted graveyard not far from here, wch I love. It is very overgrown & full of splendid trees & ivy & creepers & urns. She thought it marvellous, so on Tuesday I took advantage of a sunny afternoon to go down and photograph it. Yesterday I got the prints & am pleased with them: at least six are absolutely what I wanted.1 I shall send off for enlargements & let you see them in due course. To my delight I find that I have the headstone of a centenarian in one of them, quite accidentally! Miss Brennan2 thinks all this v. morbid, but I think I have certain affinities with the poet Gray, who as you know wrote Elegy in a Country Churchyard.
Fancy getting 15/- for the jackets!3 Well, of course, they are probably worth more in one sense, but the fellow has got to make a profit, & they have been pretty well used. In Brave New World Aldous Huxley forecast the time when we should throw clothes away much oftener, probably instead of washing them, but of course he was expecting they wd be cheaper than they are now.
My building grows slowly – very slowly. I’m sure it will never be ready on time. Did I tell you the workmen said “It walks about at night? They meant that until the stanchions are concreted the structure alters position at night in the wind and has to be adjusted each morning. I wish they would all hurry up & get on with it.
Rather foolishly I agreed to help judge a poetry competition in Suffolk & 38 awful poems, each supposed to be “A Song of Praise”, have arrived. They are nearly all indistinguishably bad. The other judges are Mrs Frances Cornford & Sir Charles Tennyson. Another literary feature of the week was a talk by Alan Pryce Jones, editor of the Times Lit. Supp., whom Kitty will have heard on the Critics. He asked me to go to lunch with him when next in London, but I don’t suppose I shall.
I was wrong about the weather – the sun couldn’t maintain itself, & really the sky is so overcast it may rain any moment. I expect it is the same with you – never mind, you must be like the sundial in Hardy’s poem that even when it is raining knows the sun is still up there & will shine again to give the sundial something to do.4
The Duffins5 are making a fearful noise downstairs: I should like to go down & lay about me with a cudgel. The squealing of the little girls, the deeper imbecilities of Duffin himself, all mingled with stamping of little feet, crashes and explosions … I should like to hurl tear-gas bombs down the chimney.
Well, it is just about noon, & I must bring my ramblings to an end. Take great care of yourself, my dear old creature, for there is much quiet enjoyment to be had from life & in any case you could ill be spared by
Your Creature. Lots of love.
1 Eva replied on 10 June: ‘It seems strange to think that the photographing of a graveyard could be even a little bit exciting. It must be a most unusual place if both you and Monica think it is marvellous. I look forward to seeing the pictures of it.’ There are numerous graveyard photographs by Larkin in the archive. See Jean Hartley, Philip Larkin, The Marvell Press and Me, 98; and James Booth, ‘Larkin as Photographer’, About Larkin 37 (April 2014), 5.
2 Maeve Brennan: the library assistant with whom Larkin was to become romantically involved in 1960.
3 Eva had written (2 June): ‘This morning I sold your three sports jackets to a second hand clothes buyer. He gave 15/- for them. I wonder if that is a fair price.’
4 ‘The Sundial on a Wet Day’.
5 Bill and Janet Duffin, colleagues of Larkin at the university, occupied the flat below his.
14 September 1958
My dear old creature,
I am on the floor of my bedroom again, for there is every sign of a fine day outside and I want to make the most of it. I shall be going out on my bike after lunch, I expect. Last Sunday I went out & did about 30
miles, to the coast & back. Pop wd like E. Riding – it’s very flat for cycling, like going to see the deer.
I was glad to get away from London – I travelled back 1st-class with a 2nd-class ticket: the railway people are getting very slack – but I suppose I had an interesting time. One of the most interesting things was my first oyster! You know I was meeting Stephen Spender for lunch. Well, he had oysters, & I didn’t dare to, but I said I’d never had one, so he gave me one of his. It wasn’t too bad! rather like having a swim. I didn’t have any more, though. There was an American there who talked all the time, so we didn’t actually get much of a chance to say anything. […]
Philip
12 October 1958
My dear old creature,
It’s just about 2 p.m. Today I went up to the university as soon as I had had breakfast & was properly shaved & dressed, to look at the building while the sun lasted – you will laugh at me, always rushing off to look at this half finished “palace of culture”, but it is starting to be more interesting inside now, & I can get inside only when the workmen aren’t there, as when they are there they scatter pebbles & cement over me from high scaffolding! [Whether]1 on purpose or not I don’t know.
Then I came back & prepared a curious saucepanful of onions, carrots, celery, tinned peas, two lamb chops, tomatoes, slices of black pudding, & broken-up spaghetti. This I set to stew! For lunch I had bacon, egg, tomato & a few more slices of black pudding. This afternoon I shall go out & see George again, about this record business (I enclose a subscription form for you to see). It is a really lovely day, autumn at its best, & I wish I had 10 hours more to cycle about the countryside looking at it.
Last night I went to Hull Fair with a few other of the university people – it is a big riotous fair, of the usual sort with lots of side shows & roundabouts, & very brightly lit, with hordes of young people in hats saying “Kiss Me Quick” surging about. I won a small china poodle & a glass dish through combined luck & cunning. At throwing at tins I was not so successful. I went in several side shows & saw “Lollo the Rat Girl” & other such spectacles. This fair is a big thing in Hull’s year and people come in from surrounding villages to spend a few hours there.
Well, I really don’t know what to say about your coming to pay me a visit! [
I have just turned off the “pot au gaz” or whatever I should call it. I expect it will provide enough for two meals. The sun has gone in now, but only in that misty winter afternoon’s way that presages no harm for old creatures. I don’t suppose you see the Sunday Dispatch: there’s a lot of guff about Kingsley in U.S. in it. Having a whale of a time, as usual. I bought 2 rather handsome ties yesterday, one black with yellow horizontal stripes!
All very best & special love, C.
1 Larkin wrote ‘When …’
2 On 14 October Eva responded: ‘You sound as if you had/ “taken umbrage” (one of Daddy’s jokes) at something I said in my letter. I don’t remember asking whether you “meant” your invitation. I do recollect saying that it wouldn’t be very nice for you to turn out of your bed to accommodate me.*
7 December 1958
My dear old creature,
[…] I feel somewhat disagreeable in one or two respects – I have now seen the proof of the record sleeve, & find to my annoyance that my charming publisher has put “Cover photo by George Hartley” on it! This seems pretty cool to me, as he did little more than press the button.1 One or two minor spectres, such as a committee tomorrow, occasionally tug my elbow. And I do feel drowsy – in fact just before I wrote “spectres” I nodded off for a few minutes. Yesterday Coveney & I went to see Indiscreet,2 a rather silly film, & then ate some curious Chinese food at one of Hull’s two Chinese restaurants. The food consists of bamboo shoots and dry little curls of stuff rather like wood shavings.3 Then we came back here and remained talking, reading, & playing records, till between one and two. […]
Wood thinks he will apply for the post of Librarian at the U.C. Swansea! I don’t imagine he will be even interviewed – hope not, anyway, as this would mean my having to write a reference for him. Nothing but a plague or act of God I fear will ever get him out of the position he now holds. Dreary blinking fool. […]
All my best love, P.
1 Philip Larkin reads ‘The Less Deceived’ (Hessle: Listen Records, The Marvell Press, 1958). The published wording is ‘Cover photograph and design by George Hartley.’ The recording had been made in the HMV Abbey Road Studios on 24 October 1958.
2 A 1958 film directed by Stanley Donen and starring Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman.
3 Philip was a regular customer of the first Chinese restaurant in Hull, the Hoi Sun, Anlaby Road, close to the station.
1959
4 January 1959
Cranston’s Ivanhoe Hotel, Bloomsbury Street, London W.C.1
My dear old creature,
This is really to warn you that a small parcel will be arriving for you from Liberty’s: it is really not meant to be opened till Saturday. I’m afraid it isn’t quite what you have in mind, but I think it’s sensible enough. I hope you like it, anyway.1
London seems much as ever: I spent some time on Thursday talking to a friend of mine in Faber’s, who eventually startled me by saying “Have you ever met Eliot? I’ll just see if he’s next door” & to my alarm reappeared leading an aged but spry Eliot who said he was sorry he couldn’t talk to me but he had a visitor himself, but that he was “pleased to see me in this office” – meaning, I suppose, that they’d like to publish me! My friend assured me that Eliot really had a visitor. I felt quite relieved he stayed only a moment, as I couldn’t think of anything to say.
I spent most of Friday arguing with shelvers & architects, but didn’t go to the conference in the evening – lazy! Monica had materialized by then & we looked about on Saturday morning: in the afternoon I did go to the conference, & in the evening we went to see The Yeomen of the Guard at the Prince’s.2 This bored me awfully to start with, but I liked the second half very much. I had a double gin before it started & the barmaid asked if I wanted anything at the interval, so I ordered two more! They were waiting without fuss when we joined the scrimmage at the interval.
Today we shall probably go to a Brigitte Bardot film3 – my choice rather than Monica’s. What we do before then I don’t know, but I can predict I shall take on board several pints of beer.
Fancy you beginning th
e story of your life! I expect you’ll find the war part dull, but do persevere, as it becomes interesting again. It is written with a deceptive simplicity, isn’t it?4
I liked your “Waverley notelet”. Monica thanks you for your card too. She was entirely unmoved by the news that her card to you had anticipated Kitty’s to Rosemary! “Life is full of such reverses” she said briskly. Tell Kitty.5
Tomorrow we return to Hull so you’ll know where to find me. The sun is shining here & I think we shall go out shortly. I hope it’s shining in York Road too!
“Going for the coke”.
All love, P.
1 Saturday 10 January was Eva’s seventy-third birthday. The present was ‘a lovely basket’ (lettercard from Eva, 11 January).
2 A Savoy Opera, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert.
3 Presumably In Case of Adversity (En cas de malheur) released in France in September 1958, directed by Claude Autant-Lara, starring Jean Gabin, Brigitte Bardot and Edwige Feuillère. The censor had cut out a two-minute sexually explicit scene.
4 On 6 January Eva wrote: ‘Much as I should like to, I’m afraid I shall never finish my bit of writing. Perhaps when I am too old to work, I might have more time to spend on it. I have not yet got farther than my childhood in Epping! It is a problem to decide what to write and what to leave out. (family skeletons!)’
5 Monica’s Christmas card to Eva had been the same as Kitty’s to Rosemary. On 6 January Eva wrote: ‘I told Kitty what Monica remarked about the Christmas cards. She said that she didn’t mind a great deal but she bought Rosemary’s card probably weeks before Monica did, and held it back until nearly Christmas Day. Also Rosemary’s card had some French on it, and Monica’s hasn’t. That is rather strange I think.’
Philip Larkin Page 37
