Philip Larkin
Page 49
With much love & constant thoughts
Philip
1 On 16 September Eva had commented on the 1966 reissue of The North Ship: ‘I like the jacket very much and have read your introduction. I have never read Yeats and think I should like to. I like “Love we must part now” very much, also “If hands could free you[,] heart”.’
16 October 1966
32 Pearson Park, Hull
My very dear old creature,
[…] It is certainly lovely at present – yesterday afternoon after shopping I drove out eastward, down that long road that leads through Ottringham & Patrington & Easington to far Spurn Head – country of flat land, red brick farms glowing in the sun, surprisingly beautiful churches, & of course the sea at the end of it. Everywhere looked beautiful. Of course it isn’t so good as cycling, but at least I get there! The haystacks are made up of rectangles of hay now – rectangular cubes – made by machines, I suppose – but the colour is the same.
The Vice Chancellor & I had a “cordial meeting” & flattered each other a good deal. I believe in buttering him up, as I think he is really very good to me & the Library. What the outcome will be I don’t know. I am trying to get another deputy – what Wood will think I don’t know.1 […]
The Abbeyfield houses sound very good ideas. You never actually stayed in one, did you? Really, though, as long as one can manage it, one’s own place where one can shut the door on the world is the best. As for giving, well, do it in guineas – not less than one or more than five, I shd say. Every little helps. The best way is a covenant over seven years, so that they can recover tax too, but this is probably too complicated for you.2
I have over £3,000 in my current a/c! I have lost faith in shares recently: still, I’ll have to do something with it. It seems odd to have all this potential experience & not do anything with it. We could go a cruise at Christmas! I could buy a cottage. Anything. Really, I have little attachment to material things – silence, solitude, warmth, records, books: this is all I need.
I have been wondering whether to pay a quick visit home next Saturday – Sunday, as well as Nov 3rd etc. It seems a long time until November. […]
Much love
Philip
1 Brenda Moon was appointed as Larkin’s second deputy alongside Arthur Wood from 1 October 1967.
2 With her letter of 11 October Eva had enclosed a cutting from The Echo (Friday 7 October 1966): ‘Mayor to Launch Appeal for Third Abbeyfield House’, requesting donations towards the provision of a third Abbeyfield House in the town. Abbeyfield is a nationwide charity providing sheltered housing and care homes for the elderly.
29 October 1966
32 Pearson Park, Hull
My dear old creature,
[…] I had a letter from Rosemary this morning, referring to my projected visit. She says her hall of residence won’t be ready by the time I go. She sounds very busy & in good spirits. The student who she thought was trying to get hold of me has been sent down for peddling drugs! Truly she lives in a more exciting atmosphere than I do.1 I had to dine in a girls’ hall here last Wednesday: I hadn’t expected much in the way of food (stuffed marrow, in the event), but they all gobbled it up like dogs, far faster than me. Afterwards I had to have coffee with four of them in one of their rooms: they told me what was wrong with the library, then relented & said it was really the best they had ever used. […]
Much love. See you Thursday. Philip
1 In a typed letter to Rosemary of 16 February 1966, headed with a creature drawing, Philip declined his niece’s invitation to give a lecture at Warwick University, where she was studying English Literature. ‘I don’t even give talks here, so if word got back to my Vice Chancellor he would probably dock my pay or something. Still, one day I hope to come to Warwick, and perhaps we can then have the informal discussion in the bar without the lecture.’ The visit was fixed for 7 November, and in four letters in October Larkin expressed his apprehension to Rosemary that he might be cornered and interviewed about his poetry by her student friends: ‘I’m really coming to see you and the Library.’ In the event he saw only the University Librarian, Peter Tucker, and Rosemary herself. (Email from Rosemary Parry, 7 December 2017.)
14 November 1966
32 Pearson Park, Hull
My very dear old creature,
Here’s the second half of your letter. I feel somewhat the worse for wear: my visitor kept me up very late, & we drank a lot: today I feel like some old dented beer can. However, she’s gone now.1 It was a beautiful day today, sunny & mild.
I have just made up my laundry, two weeks’ lot: my room seems untidy, but it will have to stay that way. Picture me hunched in my chair! Luckily Patsy wasn’t very demanding in the way of meals. An omelette or poached eggs & mushrooms were enough for her.
She said Bruce is very far gone in drink & rather a pitiable person altogether.
I haven’t done anything about my Christmas cards. Perhaps I have left it too late to order ones from the National Trust, as last year – as a matter of fact, I have quite a lot left from previous years. I wish I dare send them out! I wonder if people would remember.
I was able to show Patsy my gold medal, & felt quite proud of it!
No letter of thanks from Rosemary for the £5 I gave her: I suppose it’s just possible it isn’t required, but I should. Did you hear anything about it through Kitty? Really, R. seemed plain bored in a way that suggested I was boring her too! Heigh ho.
Telephone bill came today – £15 odd. Awgh. Awgh!! That’s for 3 months. Most of it is talking to Monica at Haydon Bridge, in the summer. I’m glad you ate her cheese. I have a very nice piece of cheddar at present – & some celery. The refectory has started serving expensive dishes – one a day – I had steak today for 7/6, it was lovely! Goodnight dear old creature.
Much love P.
1 Patsy Murphy (formerly Strang). See note to letter of 12 October 1951. After her divorce from Colin Strang in 1955, Patsy had immediately married the Irish poet Richard Murphy (May 1955), by whom she had a daughter. They divorced in 1959. She died of alcohol poisoning in Dublin in 1977.
20 November 1966
32 Pearson Park, Hull
My very dear old creature,
[…] I have now got one of those pictures of Guy the gorilla yelling, & he looks fine, just like I feel sometimes.1 On Friday I had the Hartleys round for the annual presentation of The Less Deceived accounts. Maeve came to help, but with her things went better & it was 2 am before I got to bed. They sold 517 copies last year. Not as good as the previous year, but not bad – nearly 1½ copies every day! I gave them drinks, & cheeses, French bread, celery, tomatoes & pickled walnuts. They were especially enthusiastic about the last. “I never think you can just buy them,” said Jean. There were also a couple of cakes – one of wch, a jam & cream sandwich, I have rather taken a fancy to, & shall finish.
Much love, very dear creature, Philip
1 Larkin kept a framed photograph of Guy the Gorilla (1946–78) on his desk in the University of Hull library. Guy was London Zoo’s best-loved resident at the time.
1967
8 January 1967
32 Pearson Park, Hull
My very dear old creature,
[…] After my brief experience of house-keeping at Christmas I did feel that distances were very long & rooms very crowded, & stairs very steep! I do think it would be worth while trying a simpler way of living at York Road, based on sleeping in the front room & “living” in the kitchen, doing away with the open fire in the middle room, having a fire you can sit by in the kitchen, & having a storage heater in the front room. Agreed, it wouldn’t cut out the necessity for going upstairs entirely, but it would reduce it, & I’m sure you wd feel the benefit. Much labour-saving, I think, could be effected by having only things you really use regularly close at hand. I think the store cupboard should be on the ground floor, though, for instance.1
I know you quail at the upset & expense: it would be less upset than mov
ing completely, though. I wish I could help. […]
With very much love,
Philip
1 Eva turned eighty-one on 10 January 1967. On 4 January she had written: ‘I’m glad that you managed to get a little enjoyment during your visit here at Christmas. I am so sorry that I was in bed most of the time, but I do thank you very, very much for all you did for me and the nice breakfasts you brought up for me. Whatever I should have done with no one here to care for me I don’t know. / I agree with you about the house. There are too many things in it.’
19 January 1967
32 Pearson Park, Hull
Dear old creature,
[…] I had some photographs taken in connection with the MS exhibition1 – I wish I hadn’t got such a double chin.
Like a salmon!2
Much love, old creature P.
1 Poetry in the Making: An Exhibition of Poetry Manuscripts in the British Museum, April–June 1967 (Cecil Day Lewis, W. H. Auden, Ted Hughes, Philip Larkin, Jenny Lewis, Dylan Thomas, Derek Walcott).
2 Eva replied on 21 January: ‘O, what a caricature you have made of yourself, Creature! You don’t look a bit like that.’
5 February 1967
32 Pearson Park, Hull
My dear old creature,
Another fine mild Sunday. I left the car out last night, not having the energy to put it away. There was something in the paper today about it being the most remarkable ‘false spring’ since 1817. I think it’s lovely! Carpe diem, or enjoy the day, as Oldus Creaturus, the Roman philosopher, said. […]
The snowdrops have come up by the garden gate, and there are plenty of green spikes to support them. Isn’t spring wonderful!
I have just gone to fetch myself a drink, it being nearly one o’clock. I don’t know if I shall get out today. I went to call on the Hartleys yesterday, but they were out – I had bought two ‘gift boxes’ of soap & talcum powder for their ‘little’ girls, now not so little – well, they are about 12 or 11, I suppose. I can never think of any presents for girls between giant pandas & bottles of Extase. The last time I called the Hartleys were out but the girls were in, & they made me very welcome with coffee & cake, wch I thought very nice of them.1 They are at a convent school near Swine (funny name for a village).2
Well, my dear old creature, I do hope you are well & are not feeling the effects of your illness. How is your temperature? It occurred to me that your temperature might always go up & down, but that we might not notice it except when you were ill.
Remember me to Kitty. Much love Philip.
1 Alison Hartley, thirteen years old at this time, kept a page-a-day diary. The entry for 5 February reads: ‘Larkin came – and with him he brought two presents for Laurien and I. They were Yardley talc and soap (16/3) because we were so nice to him. It pays to be nice. I got 2/- once for admiring his tie.’ The diary also records that he gave Laurien and Alison 10/- each at Christmas 1967. Laurien recalls: ‘He was always charming and talked to us children with interest.’ Personal communication, Alison and Laurien Hartley.
2 It had been a thriving pig-market in the Middle Ages.
19 March 1967
32 Pearson Park, Hull
My very dear old creature,
[…] The new library building is rising above ground now, & we shall be moving into the new bit on the north end before term starts at the end of April. I have persuaded the university to call it after the Vice Chancellor, so he should back me up in future. The Brynmor Jones Library!1 Rather a quaint thing to have done, but I suppose it will last 50 years or so, by wch time everyone will have forgotten who BJ was, & I shall be in retirement (94).
Well, my dear old creature, it’s getting on for 2 o’clock, & I have all still to do. I do hope you are all right and not spending too much time looking at the sky! I have a jazz article to write before I leave Hull, then heigh ho for a few days’ peace under your blessed roof. Very much love, dear old creature –
Philip
1 On 5 March Larkin had written: ‘I am now Librarian of the Brynmor Jones Library. He has done a great deal to build it up in all senses. Perhaps he will raise my salary! It was my idea to call the Library after him, but I made it so long ago that I had almost forgotten about it.’
6 April 1967
Hull
My dear old creature,
[…] I was shocked on Wednesday on returning from York to find a cutting saying Diana Gollancz had died. She became Princess Loewenstein-Wertheim. It was for her that I drew my first ‘creatures’ – she used to call everyone ‘dear creature’. Isn’t it sad! She was only 45. […]
Much love Philip
14 May 1967
32 Pearson Park, Hull
My very dear old creature,
It seems to be raining outside on a dull morning – I’m rather behind this morning, although I got up at 9.30 to hear the Archers. However, I was rather behind on sleep too – Friday night 4 a.m., Saturday night 2 a.m. I shall have a nice quiet day today.
Last Monday I went over to York to have dinner with this Mrs Baily,1 who is in The Retreat, & who I knew very slightly at Oxford. I was interested to see this place, & asked her to show me round before we went into the town. It looked comfortable enough, but the people sitting about looked rather forlorn! Mrs Baily said it was very expensive, but she was a NHS patient, got in by influence – her sister is the wife of a Governor, or is a governor. Mrs B. suffers from ‘depression’, whatever that is. I think she has tried to kill herself once or twice. Not very cheerful!2
Did you see a tiny mention of me on p.55 of the S. Times today – in the panel headed Modern, Not Modernist? Rather equivocal, in that I’m praised by Betjeman & Betjeman by me, but still, I’m there, the youngest person on the whole double page. Kingsley isn’t there, as far as I can see. I expect you saw that Masefield had died, the poet laureate. I wonder who’ll succeed him. I hope Betjeman, I expect Day Lewis.3 […]
I have given my old record player to the Anglican chaplaincy. The Chaplain is a nice Irishman called Quinn. They came to collect it on Friday. Hope I don’t get ‘in with the Church’, as you feared for yourself!
Still raining – I hope you are content in mind, dear old creature.
Philip.
1 Penelope Baily (‘Pen’), formerly Penelope Scott Stokes: Larkin’s early Oxford muse. She inspired Poem XXX in The North Ship, ‘So through that unripe day you bore your head’, and featured in caricature in Michaelmas Term at St Brides (1943).
2 For Penelope’s account of this meeting, in a letter to her daughter, see Susannah Tarbush, ‘From “Willow Gables” to “Aubade”: Penelope Scott Stokes and Philip Larkin’, About Larkin 26 (October 2008), 5–10.
3 Eva wrote on 15 May: ‘It is chiefly an honour, for I read that the yearly salary if it is called that, is not very much.’ Cecil Day Lewis’s surname was normally spelt with a hyphen. However, as he wrote in his autobiography The Buried Day (1960, 17), ‘As a writer I do not use the hyphen in my surname – a piece of inverted snobbery which has produced rather mixed results.’ He was appointed Poet Laureate in 1968.
21 May 1967
32 Pearson Park, Hull
My very dear old creature,
Rather a windy day today, seemingly, though I haven’t been out yet. It is warm enough to sit in my bedroom without a fire. I have found myself a large gin and so can join you & Omar Khayyam –
Ah, my Beloved, fill the cup that clears
Today of past regrets and future fears …
What a fine poem it is! have been looking at it, and my eyes are full of tears. I know you learned it in your youth, when Daddy gave you a copy. How terribly sad life is.1
Well, nobody has offered me the job of being poet laureate yet – I expect there is a subcommittee sitting on it somewhere. I personally hope Betjeman gets it: he is not only the right kind of poet, but a good poet, as The Spectator says this week. It would be a tremendous honour to be offered it, but I should be very worried about it. Anyway, I hardly think i
t’s likely.2
I have discovered a new advantage in life: Marks & Spencers shirts. I bought 4 yesterday, 3 white & 1 cream. They are only 27/11 each, quite well cut, made of cotton & nylon, & the laundry ruin my shirts in 3 years so it’s not worth buying good ones at 60/- or 70/-. If only I could solve the pyjama problem I shd be all set. […]
On Saturday 20 May Betty completed 10 years in my service: I sent her roses, & she gave me (she wasn’t in at work) a “steering wheel glove”, difficult to describe, but you’ll see it when I come. It is of leather & must have been quite dear. It was the most awful trouble to fit on – just the present for Walter, perhaps. I shall have to take her out to dinner sometime. But not yet, not yet. […]
Much love P.
1 Edward Fitzgerald, The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám (1859).
2 Eva replied on 22 May: ‘I’m glad you liked the Omar Khayyam poem, it is all so true. I wonder if the Queen would be allowed to make a choice regarding the next poet laureate. It would be strange if she mentioned you. I think many of your poems are really wonderful and Kitty thinks they are better than John Betjeman’s. I agree though, it would be rather a worry to you, for you have so little time to write. You are a very busy creature, dashing off to London and attending so many meetings and social functions.’
24 June 1967
My very dear old creature,
A rather shaky creature is sitting at the writing desk in the ‘lounge’ this bright warm summer morning. We had a late night last night; it began quite pleasantly, dinner with Betjeman & ‘Lady Elizabeth Cavendish’ (I can’t help putting her in inverted commas, but she’s perfectly genuine),1 but an actor & his wife came in later & we stayed much later than we intended. Anyway it was all very pleasant. I did not succeed in persuading Betjeman to come to Hull.2 At least, I think he might have liked to, but Lady Elizabeth put her foot down. She seems to run him.