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  • Today we are joined by our society President, Rosie Millard. Rosie came to Hull as an undergraduate while Larkin was still librarian at the university and she has maintained close links with Hull ever since. She was made Chair of Hull City of Culture 2017 and appointed OBE in the 2018 New Year Honours List for services in the arts to the city of Hull. Rosie is a writer, broadcaster and arts journalist and is also the chair of BBC Children In Need. In today’s podcast, Rosie and I discuss Solar, Money, Cut Grass and How Distant from High Windows to discuss as part of our preparations for the Philip Larkin Society Conference that is taking place in Hull March 14-15th 2024. Rosie starts us off by reflecting on her first 18 months as our president.

    With best wishes to Thomas Gordon and in memory of Andrew Eastwood.

    Philip Larkin poems referenced and discussed:

    This be The Verse, Annus Mirabilis, Going Going, How Distant, Here, The Whitsun Weddings, High Windows, The Old Fools, Absences, Cut Grass, The Mower, The Trees, Aubade, The Old Fools, The Explosion, At Grass, An Arundel Tomb, Solar, Sad Steps, Money

    Out of Reach: The Poetry of Philip Larkin by Andrew Swarbrick (St Martin’s Press, 1997)

    Poets In Their Time: Essays on English Poetry from Donne to Larkin by Barbara Everett (Clarendon Paperbacks, 1997)

    Experience by Martin Amis (Jonathan Cape, 2000)

    ‘She’s Leaving Home,’ by The Beatles from Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (Parlophone, 1967)

    Music: Shoe Shine Boy, Just a Mood, Tiger Rag from Larkin’s Jazz Disc 1 (I Remember, I Remember), Petit Fleur (Sidney Bechet) played by Monty Sunshine

    PLS Conference 2024 https://www.eventbrite.com/e/philip-larkin-society-conference-2024-tickets-769584597247

    ‘They may not mean to’ tote bag available here (thank you to Grayson Perry for the idea) and Tiny In All That Air pencils https://philiplarkin.com/shop/

    New Eyes Each Year Exhibition 2017

    https://philiplarkin.com/new-eyes-each-year/#:~:text=Larkin%3A%20New%20Eyes%20Each%20Year%20invites%20questions%20from%20the%20visitor,seen%20letters%2C%20photographs%20and%20doodles.

    https://substack.com/@rosiemillard

    The Haworth pub (once frequented by Philip Larkin and writers of Hull’s Bete Noir literary journal edited by Jean Hartley, such as Alan Plater)

    https://www.greatukpubs.co.uk/haworth-hull/food-and-drink

    Produced by Lyn Lockwood and Gavin Hogg

    Please email Lyn at [email protected] with any questions or comments

    PLS Membership and information: philiplarkin.com


    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

  • Zachary Leader is Emeritus Professor of English Literature at the University of Roehampton. He grew up in California but has lived in Britain for over fifty years and has dual US/UK citizenship. He was educated at Northwestern University, Trinity College, Cambridge, and Harvard and is the biographer of Kingsley Amis and edited the Letters of Kingsley Amis. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and General Editor of The Oxford History of Life-Writing, a 7-volume series published by OUP.

    PLS Trustee Daniel Vince is a soon-to-be graduate of the University of York, where he earned his MA by Research on the post-war working class novel. He has recently started work on his PhD entitled ‘The New University in Post-War British Literature’, in which Larkin and the University of Hull play a significant role – other writers include Malcolm Bradbury, David Lodge and Kingsley Amis. A trustee of The Philip Larkin Society, our e-newsletter editor and a member of our events committee,.

    Today’s conversation focuses on John Wain’s Hurry On Down (1953) and Philip Larkin’s Jill (1946).

    Notes and further reading and event links

    The Life of Saul Bellow by Zachary Leader (Cape, 2015)

    The Oxford Handbook of Percy Bysshe Shelley (Oxford Handbooks)

    by Michael O'Neill (Editor) (Oxford Handbooks, 2017)

    The Life of Kingsley Amis by Zachary Leader (Vintage, 2007)

    The Letters of Kingsley Amis by Zachary Leader (Editor), (Harper Collins, 2001)

    Cultural Nationalism and Modern Manuscripts: Kingsley Amis, Saul Bellow, Franz Kafka

    Zachary Leader

    https://pure.roehampton.ac.uk/portal/en/publications/cultural-nationalism-and-modern-manuscripts-kingsley-amis-saul-be 2013

    Decline and Fall by Evelyn Waugh (1928)

    Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis (1954)

    Portrait of a Lady by Henry James (1881)

    Jill by Philip Larkin (1946)

    Hurry on Down by John Wain (1953)

    Changing Places by David Lodge (1975)

    Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck (1937)

    The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger (1951)

    The Movement: English Poetry and Fiction of the 1950's by Blake Morrison (1980)

    The Movement Reconsidered: Essays on Larkin, Amis, Gunn, Davie and Their Contemporaries by Zachary Leader (OUP, 2011)

    The Importance of Philip Larkin by John Wain, The American Scholar, Vol. 55, No. 3 (Summer 1986), pp. 349-364

    Interviews with Britain's Angry Young Men: Kingsley Amis, John Braine, Bill Hopkins, John Wain and Colin Wilson: 2 (Milford Series) by Dale Salwak (Borgo Press, 2007)

    Philip Larkin: Life, Art and Love by James Booth (2015, Bloomsbury)

    Philip Larkin: A Writer’s Life by Andrew Motion (Faber, 1994)

    Philip Larkin Selected Letters ed. Anthony Thwaite (Faber and Faber, 1993)

    Out of Reach: The Poetry of Philip Larkin by Andrew Swarbrick (1997)

    Larkin poems mentioned:

    Livings, The Importance of Elsewhere, The Whitsun Weddings, High Windows, Absences, If, My Darling, This Be The Verse

    Other references:

    The Sun (British tabloid newspaper, founded 1964), John Braine (English novelist 1922-1986), Ben Johnson (English playwright- 1597-1637), Franz Kafka (Czech novelist, 1883- 1924)

    Book tickets for Chichester event here:

    https://www.eventbrite.com/e/philip-larkin-society-members-event-at-chichester-cathedral-tickets-781230199557?aff=ebdsoporgprofile

    Register for schools event here:

    https://www.eventbrite.com/e/higher-windows-post-16-english-enrichment-day-at-the-university-of-hull-tickets-737140074807?aff=ebdsoporgprofile

    Register for Conference 2024 here:

    https://www.eventbrite.com/e/philip-larkin-society-conference-2024-tickets-769584597247?aff=oddtdtcreator

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  • The Philip Larkin Society always mark the 2nd ofDecember which is the anniversary of Philip Larkin’s death in 1985. In 2022 we marked the date with the unveiling of a blue plaque in Coventry at Larkin’s birthplace and we held an evening event at Westminster Abbey with poetry readings at the site of his plaque in Poet’s Corner. It felt right to do something a little more informal and closer to home in Hull. This episode is a live recording of the quiz in the Haworth Pub, Hull.

    Thank you to Honorary Vice President of the Philip Larkin Society Alan Johnson for being such super quiz master and for our esteemed President Rosie Millard for making the journey up to Hull just for this event.

    The whole quiz and the answers are featured, so you can play along!

    The quiz questions and answers can also be found on the PLS website.

    Venue- The Haworth Pub, 449 Beverley Road, Hull, HU6 7LD

    On site recording and first edit by Philip Pullen

    Music: Zat You, Santa Claus? by Louis Armstrong and The Commanders ( November 1953)

    Produced by Lyn Lockwood and Gavin Hogg

    PLS Membership and information: philiplarkin.com

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

  • In this episode we talk to Beverley based poet Chris Sewart in his second appearance on Tiny in All That Air, and Phil Pullen, trustee of the PLS, who regular listeners will be familiar with from a number of previous episodes. We talk about Chris's poetry and his upcoming performance as the 'warm up' for Roger McGough in Beverley next year (details below). We also discuss Phil's new project for the PLS You-Tube account documenting the Larkin Trail. We end the episode considering three poems from High Windows- The Explosion, Livings and Forget What Did- as we look ahead to the 50th anniversary of the publication of High Windows in 2024 and the PLS Conference in March at the University of Hull.

    Larkin poems mentioned:

    Annus Mirabilis, Livings, Forget What Did, The Explosion, ToThe Sea, Going Going, The Building, Aubade, The Old Fools, The Trees, Solar,Cut Grass, Friday Night at the Royal Station Hotel, How Distant, I Remember, I Remember, MCMXIV, At Grass, Mr Bleaney, Absences, Broadcast, Dublinesque, ShowSaturday, Here

    The Less Deceived (Faber, 1955) The Whitsun Weddings (Faber1964), High Windows (Faber, 1974)

    Chris Sewart reads his poems A Boy and CartoonKiss.

    Home Is So Sad Beverley Art Gallery April 2023 : ‘Home is so Sad’, showcased newly commissioned artwork, alongside pieces from the permanent collections of East Riding Museums and the Philip Larkin Society featured the paintings and installations of Seoul-based artists Yeonkyoung Lee and Sam Robinson.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lr-IcSIS4mY

    A Joyous Shot

    https://www.visiteastyorkshire.co.uk/event/philip-larkin-%E2%80%93-a-joyous-shot/191184101/

    Details of the PLS Conference and other events can be found here:

    https://philiplarkin.com/uncategorized/forthcoming-events/

    The link for Chris’s poetry workshop and appearance withRoger McGough at the Stage4Beverley festival is https://stage4beverley.com/

    Today I Cycled toBeverley https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QYMXXnJ_e8

    Lyn Talking about Sylvia Plath: Horror Poet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVoi999Eywk

    The Beatles- Please, Please Me (1963, Parlophone) SgtPepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band (Parlophone, 1967), The White Album (1968,Apple)

    Oxford Book of Twentieth Century English Verse Book ed.Philip Larkin (OUP, 1973)

    Philip Larkin: Life, Art and Love by James Booth (2015,Bloomsbury)

    Somewhere becoming Rain: Collected Writings on Philip Larkin(Picador, 2019)

    The Philip Larkin I Knew by Maeve Brennan (MUP, 2002)

    Philip Larkin, The Marvell Press and Me by Jean Hartley(Faber and Faber, 2012)

    Philip Larkin: A Writer’s Life by Andrew Motion (Faber,1994)

    Letters to Monica by Philip Larkin ed. Anthony Thwaite.(Faber and Faber, 2011)

    Philip Larkin Selected Letters ed. Anthony Thwaite (Faberand Faber, 1993)

    Required Writing: Miscellaneous Pieces 1955-1982 by PhilipLarkin (Faber and Faber, 1983)

    Philip Larkin: The Man and His Work ed. Dale Salwak(Palgrave, 1983)

    Philip Larkin, Monitor, Down Cemetery Road https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Coe11pgoj8E

    Authors mentioned by Chris

    Kit de Waal | Kit de Waal

    Summerwater by Sarah Moss review – a dark holiday in Scotland |Fiction | The Guardian

    The Mersey Sound: Adrian Henri, Roger McGough and BrianPatten (Penguin, first published 1967, since reprinted many times!)

    Jonathan Edwards – The Poetry Society: Poems

    Rachel Long (rachel-long.com)

    'Instead of a card' poetry pamphlets – UK based independent publisher(candlestickpress.co.uk)

    The Catch by Simon Armitage https://www.poeticous.com/simon-armitage/the-catch-forget

    Produced by Lyn Lockwood and Gavin Hogg

    PLS Membership and information: philiplarkin.com

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

  • This episode was researched and planned by PLS Trustees Julian Henry and Dr Chris Fletcher, Keeper of Special Collections at the Bodleian Library, Oxford.

    Philip Larkin was a librarian for 42 years. He had no formal training when he set off; he chose the career on the spur of the moment as a 21 year old after leaving university, like many students, without a career in mind. However, he came to be one of the UK's most influential and ground-breaking librarians of the post-war years, and his influence is still felt today. In this episode we examine Larkin's life as a librarian and how in interwove with his writing, friendships and relationships.

    Larkin poems discussed:

    An Arundel Tomb

    The Card Players

    Long Lion Days

    Lines on a Young Lady's Photograph Album

    Wedding Wind

    The Mower

    At Grass

    Toads/ Toads Revisited

    Other references:

    My Particular Talents by Richard Goodman, About Larkin, 4 October 1997.Huddled Tea Breaks in the Cupboard by Pamela Hanley, About Larkin, 4 October 1997.https://philiplarkin.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/About-Larkin-04.pdf

    Agony in the Garden The Independent on Sunday, Dr Christopher Fletcher, 31/10/2004

    A Neglected Responsibility by Philip Larkin from Required Writing: Miscellaneous Pieces 1955-1982 (Faber, 1986)

    Letters to Monica by Philip Larkin ed. Anthony Thwaite (Faber, 2010)

    Philip Larkin: A Writer's Life by Andrew Motion (Faber, 1993)

    Produced by Lyn Lockwood and Gavin Hogg

    PLS Membership and information: philiplarkin.com

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

  • This talk was given to the Philip Larkin Society in 2010 by Emeritus Reader of American History at the University of Hull, John White. John White is the PLS jazz consultant and along with Trevor Tolley, compiled the wonderful ‘Larkin’s Jazz’ 4 disc CD released on Proper Records. This was part of the Larkin25 commemorative events. The talk is a warm and witty exploration of Larkin’s -sometimes extremely dry- sense of humour taking in camels, Jack Nicholson, raccoon coats and wine that tastes ‘like cricket bats.’

    Content warning- liberal use of swearing…

    References:

    Philip Larkin: A Writer’s Life by Andrew Motion (Faber 1993)

    Pretending to Be Me- Tom Courtney (Hachette Audio Book 2003)

    The Philip Larkin I Knew- Maeve Brennan (Manchester University Press, 2002)

    Selected Letters of Philip Larkin 1940-1985 (ed. Anthony Thwaite, Faber 1992)

    Philip Larkin: A Bibliography, 1933-1994- B Bloomfield

    All What Jazz: A Record Diary 1961 - 1971 (Faber) Philip Larkin

    Poems referenced:

    Church Going, Wild Oats, This Be The Verse, Vers de Societe,

    Self’s The Man read by Philip Larkin can be heard at the end of the talk.

    Produced by Lyn Lockwood and Gavin Hogg

    PLS Membership and information: philiplarkin.com

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz



  • Philip Larkin was just five years old when Hardy died in 1928, but this English poet and novelist was going to have a profound influence on Larkin’s writing.

    To discuss some of the connections between Larkin and Hardy, Lyn is joined by Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Hull Jane Thomas and composer Arthur Keegan.

    Thomas Hardy Novels: Jude the Obscure, Far From the Madding Crowd, Jude the Obscure, A Pair of Blue Eyes,

    Thomas Hardy Collections: The Dynasts, Winter Words, Poems 1912-13

    Thomas Hardy poems: Drummer Hodge, Neutral Tones, Afterwards, Lying Awake, A Circular

    Philip Larkin poems: No Road, The Mower, Aubade, Skin

    Other references: DH Lawrence, Sappho, Darwin, JS Mill, WB Yeats, Dylan Thomas, Gustav Holst, Gerald Finzie, Ivor Gurney, Nicholas Moore (composer), Benjamin Britten, Imogen Holst, Robin Milford, Henry Handel Richardson,

    Early Larkin by James Underwood (Bloomsbury 2021)

    Philip Larkin: Life, Art and Love by James Booth (Bloomsbury 2015)

    The Oxford Book of Twentieth Century English Verse ed Philip Larkin (Oxford 1973)

    Required Writing- Miscellaneous Pieces by Philip Larkin (1955-1982) Faber 1983 (‘Wanted, a good Hardy critic’)

    Astonishing the Brickwork by James L. Orwin (Dancing Sisters, 2022)

    https://philiplarkin.com/product/astonishing-the-brickwork-philip-larkin-set-to-music-jim-orwin/

    Peaches by The Stranglers (1977)/ Budmouth Dears by Thomas Hardy (first published in The Dynasts, 1908),

    Elegies for Emma/Elegies for Tom https://www.arthurkeegan.co.uk/

    Produced by Lyn Lockwood and Gavin Hogg

    Please email Lyn at [email protected] with any questions or comments

    PLS Membership and information: philiplarkin.com


    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz


  • This talk was given to the PLS in 2001 by Winifred Dawson. Winifred was born in London, but educated in Belfast which is where she met Larkin when they were both working at Queen’s University Library. Win also went on to write herself and published a biography of Amy Audrey Locke, a muse for the poet WB Yeats. Win opens with a reflection on Larkin’s love for his parents, However, the talk is mainly about Larkin’s relationship with the women in his life: Ruth Bowman, Winifred, Monica Jones, Patsy Strang, Maeve Brennan (who is listening in the audience) and Betty Mackereth. Ruth, Maeve and Win went on to form a friendship, having first met at Ruth's house in 1993, 8 years after Larkin died. Maeve Brennan can be heard very briefly at the end of the talk.

    The talk is full of humour, and a frank account of her feelings about Larkin, as well as readings of Larkin’s poetry and letters. The poetry readings were not recorded at the time of the talk, and so are instead read by members of the current Philip Larkin Society committee. We have also added the 1975 poem ‘When first we faced’ after Toads Revisited as a second poem about Betty Mackereth.Books and writers mentioned:

    Philip Larkin: A Writer’s Life by Andrew Motion(1993)

    Philip Larkin Selected Letters ed. Anthony Thwaite (1993)

    Playing the Harlot- Patsy Avis (published by Virago in 1996)

    Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis (1954)

    Peter Ackroyd, Katherine Mansfield, Flann O’Brien’s At Swim-Two- Birds (1939), The Real Charlotte by Somerville and Ross (1894), John Betjeman, Scenes from Provincial Life by William Cooper (1950) , DH Lawrence,

    The Porter’s Daughter: The Life of Amy Audrey Locke by Winifred Dawson (Sarsen Press, 2014)

    Larkin’s review of The Girls by Henry de Montherlant (1959) can be found in Required Writing (1983)

    Poems mentioned- poems which are read in the episode are in bold:

    Days, Faith Healing, An April Sunday Brings the Snow , Reference Back, Mother, Summer, I Wild Oats, No Road, Within the dream you said, Show Saturday, Talking in Bed, Poem About Oxford, Latest Face, Lines on a Young Lady’s Photograph Album, At thirty-one, when some are rich He hears his beloved, Long roots, Maiden Name, Broadcast, Morning at last, Toads Revisited, When First We Faced, To My Wife, Counting, An Arundel Tomb

    References:

    https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/aug/28/winifred-dawson Ann Thwaite’s obituary of Win Dawson

    https://philiplarkin.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/About-Larkin-01.pdf First issue of About Larkin

    Further reading:

    Philip Larkin, Life, Art and Love by James Booth (Bloomsbury, 2014)

    Thank you to Jim Orwin for the original recording and sleeve notes. Thank you to Graham Chesters, Simon Smith, Daniel Vince, Phil Pullen, Clarissa Hard, Rachael Galletly, Alex Davis, Gavin Hogg and Julian wild for reading the poems.

    Produced by Lyn Lockwood and Gavin Hogg

    PLS Membership and information: philiplarkin.com

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

  • This episode features a writer who would be familiar not only to Hull residents but also to keen telly watchers, radio listeners and theatre goers across the country. Alan Plater was born in Jarrow in 1935 but having moved to Hull when he was just three years old, the city was pleased to adopt him and he lived there for much of his life. His most famous writing credit was probably Z Cars. Alan Plater was also a huge fan of jazz music and his ITV comedy drama The Beiderbecke Affair staring James Bolam and Barbara Flynn in the mid 1980s was a massive success. He went on to win countless awards and accolades for his wonderful writing.

    Alan Plater was enormously generous with his time, and madea huge contribution to the Hull arts scene of the 1960s and 70s, developing agentle friendship with Philip Larkin along the way. This speech was recorded on28th November 1998, and wasgiven at that year’s PLS AGM.

    Thank you so much to Alexandra Cann who is the agent for theAlan Plater Literary Estate Ltd for giving us the initial approval to use thisrecording, and to Steve Plater and John Rubinstein who are the joint Directorsof the Lit Estate.

    If you are interested in seeing an Alan Plater play thissummer, then the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough is putting on aproduction of the Blonde Bombshells of 1943 which is full of swing and jazz, from 2-26thAugust 2023.

    https://sjt.uk.com/events/blonde-bombshells-of-1943

    References:

    Alfred Bradley https://www.bbc.co.uk/writersroom/about/successes/alfred-bradley-award/

    · The Occasional Smell of Fish (poem)

    · Waiting for Gladys (Becket parody)

    · Bete Noire (Hull poetry journal)

    · Z Cars One Day In Spring Street

    · Jazz Notes- BBC radio programme

    · On Sunday January 4th I had MildConstipation

    · Names (poem written for Three Trawlersfundraising) ‘my only grown up poem’

    · Swallows on the Water (play)

    · The Fosdyke Saga sonnet ( BBC radio tripe themed-parody of The Forsyth Saga,)- sent a copy to Larkin who responded with asigned copy of the High Windows calling him ‘sonnetteer extraordinaire’

    · Sweet Sorrow (1990) Plater’s play about Larkin

    Matthew Arnold, Ogden Nash, Dylan Thomas, Alan Bleasdale,Ted Hughes, Barry Hines, Vera Wise, Henry Livings, Alex Glasgow, Carla Lane,Adrian Mitchell, Allan Ginsburg, Carole Mills (rude songs and low down blues),Robin Kay (flamenco guitarist), Max Boylett (jazz pianist), Ian Clarke andChris Rowe, Sid and Norm (artists without category), Joe Orton, The Beatles,John Ford (director of westerns), Roger McGough, Jimmy James (music hallperformer),Ken Wagstaff- (footballing hero), Fleur Adcock, Jeff Nuttall (had apee in a bucket on stage), Roni Scott, Suzi Quatro, Mike Bradwell (theatredirector), Jess Stacy (jazz pianist), Shakespeare, Max Wall, Peter Brooke(director), and many more Hull poetslisted by Plater.

    Pubs mentioned – (in Leeds and Hull) The Bluebell, The Bull,The Fenton, the Hayworth Arms,

    Philip Larkin judging poetry competition for the Hull ArtsCentre at Spring Street in 1970 which eventually became Hull Truck Theatre.

    The loss of the three Hull trawlers in winter of 1967, 59trawlerman died- the poets organised a reading and Plater wrote ‘Names’.

    Produced by Lyn Lockwood and Gavin Hogg

    PLS Membership and information: The Philip Larkin Society – Philip Larkin

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

  • At the time of recording this podcast we received the sad news that our founding chairman Professor Eddie Dawes had passed away on the 3rd March 2023 at the age of 97. Gavin and I were very privileged to be able to record the very first Tiny podcast with Eddie at his home in Hull. Eddie was so open to new ideas and ways of doing things. He was so supportive of my crazy idea to have a society podcast and was extremely patient as I fussed around with my microphone and notes. But I knew that Eddie had to be our very first guest- he was- and still is- the world’s leading authority on the history of magic, a pioneering biochemist, the PLS chairman for over 20 years and good friends with Philip Larkin himself. A remarkable lifetime and a really lovely, gentle person who, as current chair Graham Chesters said, did indeed wear his exceptional gifts lightly.

    Our guests this week are Clarissa Hard, PLS trustee and editor of About Larkin, and Francesca Gardner, who join me to talk about things and objects- objects in Larkin’s poetry and the significant objects in Larkin’s life; cigarette packets, socks, lawnmowers, vases, photo albums and more.

    Francesca Gardner Larkin’s Meditating Machines (PLS Conference 2022) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHFDxFakbq4

    Clarissa Hard Larkin: Churchgoer? (PLS Conference 2022)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PARTGcDGyq8

    Home is So Sad, from 1st April to 13th May at Beverley Art gallery.

    Home is So Sad presents newly commissioned paintings and installation art by Seoul-based artists Yeonkyoung Lee and Sam Robinson. Their work reflects a long-standing interest in the life and work of Philip Larkin, the details of everyday life, and the idea of ‘home’ as a fluid concept. Alongside this, the artists have selected pieces from the permanent collections of East Riding Museums and the Philip Larkin Society. During the exhibition there is an additional display of Larkin artefacts on show in the red gallery and there is a beautiful vase used as the main image on the publicity poster of course.

    https://www.eastridingmuseums.co.uk/whats-on/?entry=home_is_so_sad

    A Joyous Shot Friday 14th April, East Riding Theatre, Beverley

    An evening of Larkin inspired words and music with Hull writer Vicky Foster, Beverley poet Chris Sewart and The Mechanicals Band- all of whom are old friends of the podcast. Please come along and enjoy what I’m sure will be a wonderful evening.

    https://www.eastridingtheatre.co.uk/philip-larkin-a-joyous-shot/

    Larkin poems discussed:

    High Windows, The Mower, Aubade, Wires, Aubade, Reference Back, Ambulances, Afternoons, Self’s The Man, Dockery and Son, Here, The Whitsun Weddings, Home Is So Sad.

    Other books and references:

    Rime of the Ancient Mariner by ST Coleridge, Ozymandia by PB Shelley, The Mower by Andrew Marvell, Richard Bradford, The Importance of Elsewhere (Francis Howard Publishing, 2015), J. H. Prynne Acquisition of Love, Mark Waldron I wish I loved lawnmowers, Bill Brown Thing Theory, Gaston Bachelard The Material Imagination.

    Podcast produced by Lyn Lockwood and Gavin Hogg

    PLS Membership and information: The Philip Larkin Society – Philip Larkin

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

  • Anne Fine gave our Distinguished Guest Lecture at the PLS AGM in 2004 and here we reproduce her talk in its entirety. Anne muses on how she discovered Larkin as a teenager who couldn't resist poems with swear words in, but also how she came to see the connections between Larkin’s poetry and her own life- especially The Trees- as well as her admiration for Larkin the professional writer as a fellow member of the ‘business.’

    Anne is best known for children's books,  but she also writes for adults. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and she was appointed an OBE in 2003. She has won the annual Carnegie Medal twice and she also won the Guardian Prize, Smarties Prize, two Whitbread Awards, and she was twice Children's Author of the Year. From 2001 to 2003, Anne was the Children's Laureate in the UK. In 1987, Anne published Madame Doubtfire, which became the classic Twentieth Century Fox movie Mrs Doubtfire, starring Robin Williams.

    Thank you to Anne for kindly giving us permission to use this talk on the podcast.

  • This episode’s guests are Gavin Hogg and Bruce Lindsay and we are discussing Ivor Cutler, poet, writer, teacher and musician, who was born Jan 15th 1923 and so is a close chronological contemporary of Philip Larkin, although their paths never crossed. We look at their surreal sense of humour, their different experiences of World War II, their approach to poetry, letter writing, jazz, public performance and the cultural landscape of Britain in the twentieth century.

    Bruce Lindsay, Ivor Cutler: Life Outside the Sitting Room (Equinox, 2023)

    https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/ivor-cutler/

    Gavin Hogg and Hamish Ironside, We Peaked At Paper An Oral History of Fanzines (Boatwhistle Press, 2022)

    https://www.boatwhistle.com/we-peaked-at-paper

    Ivor Cutler poems referenced:

    A Flat Man; Is that your Flap, Jack?; Creamy Pumpkins; Cycling; Giant: I Believe in Bugs; Mud; Pass the Ball, Jim ; Pickle Your Knees, Sleepy Old Snake; Life in A Scotch Sitting Room Vol 2

    John Peel Sessions: https://peel.fandom.com/wiki/Ivor_Cutler

    Philip Larkin poems referenced:

    Bridge for the Living, Aubade, Essential Beauty, Mr Bleaney, Church Going

    The Sunday Sessions (Faber and Faber, 1980)

    The Selected Letters of Philip Larkin ed. Anthony Thwaite (Faber, 1993)

    Letters to Monica by Philip Larkin ed. Anthony Thwaite (Faber, 2011)

    Read more about Brunette Coleman in Trouble at Willow Gables and Other Fictions ed. James Booth (Faber and Faber, 2002)

    Other cultural references

    Centipede (band), John Peel, The Fall, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Albert Ammonds, Miles Davis, Robert Wyatt, Spike Milligan, The Goons, John Betjeman, John Cooper Clark, Van Morrison, Linton Kwesi Johnson Forces of Victory (1979), Harold Pinter, Charlie Parker, Neil Ardley, Count Basie, Charlie Parker, Thelonious Monk, Sidney Bechet.

    Interludes – Thelonious Monk (Round Midnight and Thelonius)

    Produced by Lyn Lockwood and Gavin Hogg

    PLS Membership and information: The Philip Larkin Society – Philip Larkin

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

  • This episode welcomes three Larkin100 trustees to look back on 2022; Graham Chesters, Phil Pullen, and teacher, writer and poet Vicky Foster who has a very particular connection to Hull and the work of Philip Larkin.

    Vicky Foster Poet Hull

    Please watch and subscribe; https://www.youtube.com/@thephiliplarkinsociety1930/featured

    PLS Membership and information: The Philip Larkin Society – Philip Larkin

    Presented by Lyn Lockwood.

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

    Audio editing by Simon Galloway.

    Follow us and get it touch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/tiny_air

    Find out more about the Philip Larkin Society here - http://philiplarkin.com/

  • This episode features Belfast arts manager Hugh Odling- Smee and PLS trustee Philip Pullen who, as part of his centenary lecture tour, took part in the 2022 Belfast International Arts Festival with a talk on Larkin in Belfast. Hugh and Phil discuss the literary heritage that Belfast enjoys and Larkin’s life in Belfast between 1950 and 1955.

    Books and writers discussed:

    A Rumoured City: New Poets from Hull by Douglas Dunn (Editor), Philip Larkin (foreword), (Bloodaxe, 1982)

    Oxford Book of Twentieth Century English Verse ed. Philip Larkin (OUP, 1973)

    Andrew Motion- Larkin A Writer’s Life (Faber, 2018)

    Belfast poets: John Hewitt (1907-1987), Louis MacNeice (1907-1963)

    Brian Moore (1921-1999)- The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne (HarperCollins 1955),  (Harper Perennial Modern Classics series, 2007 re-issue)/film version dir. Jack Clayton (1987)

    Odd Man Out (1945)- FL Green

    The Importance of Elsewhere- Richard Bradford (Frances Lincoln, 2015)

    Letters to Monica by Philip Larkin ed. Antony Thwaite (Faber, 2011)

    Larkin poems:

    The Less Deceived (Faber 1955)

    The Importance of Elsewhere, Maiden Name, Absences, Single to Belfast (unpublished during lifetime), Water, Church Going, Mr Bleaney, Lines on a Young Lady’s Photograph Album, Reasons for Attendance

    Philip Pullen ‘s Belfast talk : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxbKmDJUOH4 The Importance of Elsewhere - Philip Pullen presentation, Belfast International Arts Festival 2022

    Larkin100 events: https://philiplarkin.com/news/larkin100-whats-coming-up/

    Presented by Lyn Lockwood.

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

    Audio editing by Simon Galloway.

    Follow us and get it touch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/tiny_air

    Find out more about the Philip Larkin Society here -

  • Daniel Vince joined the PLS board of trustees earlier this year and is currently studying for a Masters by research on the post-war novel at the University of York having graduated from Canterbury Christ Church University earlier this year. He is also an antiquarian book seller and can often be found hunting down rare and wonderful books. When the Barbara Pym Society invited a member of the PLS to present a paper at their AGM in Oxford this year, Daniel bravely took up the challenge. Daniel speaks to Lyn and reads his talk A Few Green Leaves: Pym, Larkin and Rural Retirement.

    Larkin texts referenced: Aubade, Money, Spring, Here, Toads, The Mower, Cut Grass, High Windows, The Importance of Elsewhere,  A Girl In Winter (Faber 1947)

    Barbara Pym novels: A Few Green Leaves, A Quartet in Autumn, The Sweet Dove Died

    Other writers/references:  Ending Up by Kingsley Amis, The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir, Hippopotamus by TS Eliot,

    Further reading: The Adventures of Miss Barbara Pym by Paula Byrne (2021) A Very Private Eye: The Diaries, Letters And Notebooks Of Barbara Pym ed. Hazel Holt (Macmillan 1984)

    Presented by Lyn Lockwood.

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

    Audio editing by Simon Galloway.

    Follow us and get it touch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/tiny_air

    Find out more about the Philip Larkin Society here - http://philiplarkin.com/

  • Dr Sam Perry teaches English Literature at the University of Hull, where he is a member of the Philip Larkin Centre for Poetry & Creative Writing. He is the author of Chameleon Poet: R.S. Thomas and the Literary Tradition (Oxford University Press) and is currently working on a long- term project exploring the representation of children and childhood in modern poetry.

    Other writers discussed/mentioned: WB Yeats/Ted Hughes/Edward Thomas/ RS Thomas/Seamus Heaney/ William Wordsworth/William Blake/ Thomas Hardy/ Dylan Thomas /Charles Dickens/JD Salinger/Virginia Woolf/Kingsley Amis/Sylvia Plath/Ann Thwaite

    Larkin poems discussed: Sunny Prestatyn/ Essential Beauty/The Large Cool Store/ Mr Bleaney/Aubade/Home is So Sad/ Wild Oats/ Dockery and Son/Ignorance/Afternoons/An Arundel Tomb/ I Remember, I Remember/ This Be The Verse/High Windows

    Other references: Jim Sutton’s letters to Philip Larkin/The art of Rene Magritte (1898-1967)/Larkin’s Doodles/Letters to Monica Ed. Anthony Thwaite (Faber 2011)/The Secret Garden - Francis Hodgson Burnett (Heinemann 1911)/The Image of Childhood- Peter Coveney (Penguin 1967)

    Presented by Lyn Lockwood.

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

    Audio editing by Simon Galloway.

    Follow us and get it touch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/tiny_air

    Find out more about the Philip Larkin Society here - http://philiplarkin.com/

  • Welcome to a very special episode of Tiny In All That Air, celebrating Philip Larkin's 100th birthday. This episode has been made with the generous help of many of our fantastic honorary vice presidents, who have many different connections with Philip Larkin, the man and the writer: former secretary of State for Health and Social care, Alan Johnson; Larkin biographer, friend and literary executor Andrew Motion; writer David Quantick; writer Ann Thwaite; academic and magician Dale Salwak; artist Grayson Perry; poet Imtiaz Dharker; sculptor Martin Jennings; writer Blake Morrison; Professor James Booth; founding chairman Professor Eddie Dawes; and our current chair Rosie Millard. Thank you so much to all our HVPs past and present for all their support of the society and thank you to you for listening.

    Presented by Lyn Lockwood.

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

    Audio editing by Simon Galloway.

    Follow us and get it touch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/tiny_air

    Find out more about the Philip Larkin Society here - http://philiplarkin.com/

  • This is the King Henry VIII School, Coventry takeover! Led by the school's Librarian and Archivist Helen Cooper, and introduced by former Head of English Sheila Woolf, the pupils of Larkin's former school in Coventry have recorded a fascinating short fictional play written by Fred Holland that explores the Larkin family during Word War II. Helen Cooper and Phil Pullen (Chair of Larkin100 and Larkin researcher) join Lyn to discuss the writing and performance of the play, as well as exploring the play's many themes- family life, gender identity, jazz music, the destruction of Coventry, the rise of fascism and pre-war Germany. The performance also includes full readings of three very relevant Larkin poems.

    Also profound thanks to Dan Balcam, the School’s Performing Arts Technician who recorded the performance and added the sound effects, and Sheila Woolf for her help with the adaptation of the play and her introduction explaining its history. Most of all, however, thank you very much indeed to the cast of Year 12 and Year 13 pupils who found time in their busy schedules to perform the play:

    Clemi Andrews: Eva Larkin

    Leong Yi Au: Narrator #2

    Ben Cartwright: Philip Larkin

    Simran Cheema: Narrator #1

    Aston McKeown: Captain Stanley Hector, Chief Constable of Coventry

    Ocean: Sydney Larkin, Coventry City Treasurer

    Adam Price: Roger Smythe

    Poems: Ultimatum, This Be the Verse, Snow In April, For Sidney Bechet

    Other texts and references:

    Sir Oswald Mosley, Sir Barry Domvile, Diana Mitford, Peaky Blinders (2013-2022 BBC), James Booth Life, Art and Love (2014, Bloomsbury), Trouble at Willow Gables and Other Fictions (Faber & Faber 2015),  Andrew Motion Philip Larkin A Writer's Life (Faber 1993)

    Selected letters of Philip Larkin (1993, Faber & Faber)  Barbara Pym Some Tame Gazelle (1950, Virago Modern Classics), Julia Boyd Travellers in the Third Reich  (2018,Elliott & Thompson Limited)

    John Kenyon's article about Philip Larkin can be read here

    https://philiplarkin.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/larkin_at_hull_jkenyon.pdf

    This podcast is one of the many Centenary events that celebrate 100 years since the birth of Philip Larkin, run by the Philip Larkin Society and Larkin 100.

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    Presented by Lyn Lockwood.

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

    Audio editing by Simon Galloway.

    Follow us and get it touch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/tiny_air

    Find out more about the Philip Larkin Society here - http://philiplarkin.com/

  • In this episode, Lyn talks to Emeritus AC Bradley Professor of Modern Literature at Liverpool University Kelvin Everest and writer, lecturer and poet Dr Jane Bluett, who is the poetry editor for English In Education. 

    Monica and Philip met in Leicester in 1947, and although Philip soon left Leicester for Belfast and then Hull, Monica stayed as a lecturer at Leicester University for the next 34 years until her retirement. Their life long love affair was a source of great joy and great anguish for both of them. Kelvin tells us about his two years working alongside Monica as a young lecturer in the late 1970s. Jane reflects on Monica’s role as the woman in the background - like Emma Hardy or Viv Eliot - and discusses her influence on Larkin’s poetry. Monica was born on 7th May 2022 and so this podcast marks her centenary which, of course, she shares with Philip Larkin.

    Having met through their shared background of poetry and education, Lyn and Jane also read their own poems about Philip Larkin.

    References:

    Philip Larkin: Letters to Monica ed. Anthony Thwaite (2011), Andrew Motion: A Writer’s Life (1994), John Sutherland: Monica Jones, Philip Larkin and Me: Her Life and Long Loves (2021), Martin Amis: Inside Story (2020), Philip Larkin: Selected Letters ed. Anthony Thwaite (1993) George Crabbe: The Borough (1810), Benjamin Britten: Peter Grimes (1943), Dennis Telford: Monica Dearest Bun, A Haydon Bridge Love Story (2014) Kingsley Amis: Lucky Jim (1954).

    Haydon Bridge blue plaque: http://www.haydon-bridge.co.uk/larkin.php

    Larkin poems referred to: An Arundel Tomb, Annus Horribilis, Show Saturday, Talking In Bed, Wild Oats.

    Monica reads One More Quadrille by Winthrop Mackworth Praed (1802-1839). More information can be found here https://literarywoolgatherings.wordpress.com/2020/07/04/winthrop-mackworth-praed-part-1/ and The End of the Episode by Thomas Hardy (1909).

    Kelvin Everest: Keats and Shelley Winds of Light (2021) Keats and Shelley: Winds of Light combines unrivalled textual knowledge, biographical and contextual expertise, and profoundly insightful close readings of the poetry in a selection of outstanding essays from a leading critic of English Romantic Poetry. (OUP).

    This podcast is one of the many Centenary events that celebrate 100 years since the birth of Philip Larkin run by the Philip Larkin Society and Larkin100.

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    Presented by Lyn Lockwood.

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

    Audio editing by Simon Galloway.

    Follow us and get it touch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/tiny_air

    Find out more about the Philip Larkin Society here - http://philiplarkin.com/

  • In this episode, Lyn talks to Deb Fisher, Chair of the Barbara Pym Society and writer and actor Triona Adams, also a member of the Barbara Pym Society.  We discuss how it was Larkin who initiated the friendship between the two writers in 1961 when he wrote a letter to Pym admiring her novels.  Both Oxford graduates, and resolutely unmarried, they communicated by letter for 14 years until they finally met in person at the Randolph Hotel in Oxford.  In 1977, the Times Literary Supplement printed an article where contributors named who they considered the most underrated writers of the previous seventy-five years. Pym was the only living writer to appear on the list twice, chosen by  Lord David Cecil and Philip Larkin. Larkin praised her “unique eye and ear for the small poignancies and comedies of everyday life.” Their friendship, although mainly on paper, was remarkably kind and supportive, underpinned by their love of tradition, domesticity and of each others’ work. We talk about the qualities of Pym's writing, her life and loves, and her lasting legacy, with loyal readers and researchers all around the world today.

    References:

    The novels of Barbara Pym from Crampton Hodnet (written 1940)  to A Few Green Leaves (1980), BBC R4 Women’s Hour, Andrew Motion A Writer’s Life (1994), Paula Byrne The Adventures of Miss Barbara Pym (2021), Hazel Holt  A Lot to Ask: A Life of Barbara Pym  (1990), Barbara Pym A Very Private Eye: An Autobiography in Diaries and Letters (1984)

    Oliver Ford Davies as Philip Larkin Theatre review: Larkin with Women at Orange Tree, Richmond

    Theatre review: Larkin with Women at Orange Tree, Richmond

    Larkin poems referred to: Church Going, Ambulances

    The Barbara Pym Society https://barbara-pym.org/

    2022 Spring Meeting; 30 April 2022: University Women's Club, Mayfair, London 'We Used To Correspond 'The Pym-Larkin letters, featuring Triona Adams and Ben Willbond (Horrible Histories/Ghosts) – please see the website for full details.

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    Presented by Lyn Lockwood.

    Theme music: 'The Horns Of The Morning' by The Mechanicals Band. Buy 'The Righteous Jazz' at their Bandcamp page: https://themechanicalsband.bandcamp.com/album/the-righteous-jazz

    Audio editing by Simon Galloway.

    Follow us and get it touch on Twitter - https://twitter.com/tiny_air

    Find out more about the Philip Larkin Society here - http://philiplarkin.com/