Giant Stories:
Philip Larkin in Wellington
Philip Larkin is widely regarded as one of the most important British literary figures of the twentieth century. Famed for his no-nonsense and down-to-earth style, he was a key figure in ‘the movement’, a group of writers of the 1950s and ‘60s that sought to describe the world in everyday language and take poetry out of the classroom and onto the streets. Larkin’s literary career began in Wellington, where he became the town’s Librarian in 1943.
Arrival
Philip Larkin saw the advert for the job he later said “seemed to determine the course of my life” while reading the Birmingham Post at his family home in Warwick, after gaining a First Class honours degree in English from St John’s College Oxford that summer. Despite Wellington library having been open since 1902, it was, incredibly, the first time the post of librarian had ever been advertised; Arthur Bennett, the previous incumbent, having been in charge since day one! Larkin, who had been exempted from military service, arrived by train for a successful interview at the end of November and soon embarked on a thirty-month stay that would prove character-defining in many ways!
A Study of Reading Habits
“The Library” Larkin reflected soon after arrival “is a curious place… it is a dreadful mess.” Indeed, the scene the young (and completely untrained) graduate found was one of near desolation! Battling archaic working conditions, an antiquated stock of poorly catalogued books and a practically non-existent system for lending them (“if a book fails to return it is forgotten about”), Larkin began the task of dragging the Edwardian facility kicking-and-screaming into the twentieth century!
His predecessor, Mr Bennett (who was also the caretaker), was infamous for ruling the library with a rod of iron, especially where younger readers were concerned. Larkin could be an imposing figure, too, but his passion for engaging a more youthful audience is made clear in his monthly reports to the committee charged with managing the council-run facility.
“The junior members of the Library are serious and enthusiastic readers, and would repay increased consideration. 300 junior members per 1,000 is a high percentage for a Municipal Library, and this is due to the fact that they regard library-going as a social event, often bringing friends who join also.”
“The Library” Larkin reflected soon after arrival “is a curious place… it is a dreadful mess.” Indeed, the scene the young (and completely untrained) graduate found was one of near desolation! Battling archaic working conditions, an antiquated stock of poorly catalogued books and a practically non-existent system for lending them (“if a book fails to return it is forgotten about”), Larkin began the task of dragging the Edwardian facility kicking-and-screaming into the twentieth century!
His predecessor, Mr Bennett (who was also the caretaker), was infamous for ruling the library with a rod of iron, especially where younger readers were concerned. Larkin could be an imposing figure, too, but his passion for engaging a more youthful audience is made clear in his monthly reports to the committee charged with managing the council-run facility.
“The junior members of the Library are serious and enthusiastic readers, and would repay increased consideration. 300 junior members per 1,000 is a high percentage for a Municipal Library, and this is due to the fact that they regard library-going as a social event, often bringing friends who join also.”
Larkin also set about refining the library’s stock of non-fiction titles, adding a second hand, 24-volume set of encyclopaedias and four new periodicals to the roster. Such was the extent of the improvements (issues rose by 173% in a single calendar year) even the Wellington Journal and Shrewsbury News, the local newspaper, was compelled to report on the transformation taking place! Indeed, at the end of his tenure Larkin was forced to include he would probably never do a job so well again, or enjoy so much responsibility. However, the library would make a telling contribution to his life in other ways, too.
A Writer
Larkin confessed that the idea of getting a flat in Wellington was beyond his imagination, and stayed the entire duration in rented digs. Such were the Spartan nature of the conditions at Glentworth in King Street (where he spent the majority of his time), he resorted to writing in the library between shifts — which could span the best part of a 12-hour day. Being away from home, said Larkin, created a “raw state of mind that was very fruitful”, and it was here that the bulk of his first poetry collection, The North Ship, and his only two novels, Jill and A Girl In Winter, were written. In later life, Larkin reflected that Wellington was the only place he felt he’d ever done any real work, and he certainly used his time productively: whether stealing five minutes in the Buck’s Head pub to compose poetry in the first of his famous notebooks (following an unsuccessful attempt to pursue a ‘recalcitrant borrower’ in Arleston!), or finding time to sit and write in the local cemetery — which may have inspired a lifelong love of graveyards. It was in Wellington, too, that Larkin became a prolific letter writer, a trait that would endure for a lifetime.
Wild Oats
Writing in the forward to the second edition of The North Ship in 1966, Larkin reflected on the “abandoned version” of his former self “isolated in Shropshire with a complete Yeats stolen from the local girls’ school.” The Irish poet was indeed a huge influence on the romantic imagery of a collection that would prove atypical of the style with which Larkin would establish his reputation. Wellington would, however, prove pivotal in moulding his attitude to life, love and relationships — the subjects of his greatest work. That copy of the complete Yeats was pilfered by Ruth Bowman, a pupil at the Girls’ High School who would eventually become Larkin’s fiancée. Their friendship was a rich source of gossip, and the sight of the two walking along Haygate Road to Ruth’s Herbert Avenue home, reciting poetry to each other, was well-remembered by locals. While Ruth’s mother would label the young poet-librarian “arty, unreliable and doomed to cause heartbreak” their relationship would nevertheless survive his residency in the town by at least four years — although she had already departed to study at Oxford before he left.
Before Ruth, Larkin dated several local women, including Ruth’s friend Jane Exall. “I would find Jane hard to resist if she gave me anything to resist” he confided to friend Kingsley Amiss (who visited Wellington on several occasions)! Some twenty years later, those erstwhile encounters would provide the inspiration for the poem Wild Oats from the revered Whitsun Weddings collection.
Wild Oats
Writing in the forward to the second edition of The North Ship in 1966, Larkin reflected on the “abandoned version” of his former self “isolated in Shropshire with a complete Yeats stolen from the local girls’ school.” The Irish poet was indeed a huge influence on the romantic imagery of a collection that would prove atypical of the style with which Larkin would establish his reputation. Wellington would, however, prove pivotal in moulding his attitude to life, love and relationships — the subjects of his greatest work. That copy of the complete Yeats was pilfered by Ruth Bowman, a pupil at the Girls’ High School who would eventually become Larkin’s fiancée. Their friendship was a rich source of gossip, and the sight of the two walking along Haygate Road to Ruth’s Herbert Avenue home, reciting poetry to each other, was well-remembered by locals. While Ruth’s mother would label the young poet-librarian “arty, unreliable and doomed to cause heartbreak” their relationship would nevertheless survive his residency in the town by at least four years — although she had already departed to study at Oxford before he left.
Before Ruth, Larkin dated several local women, including Ruth’s friend Jane Exall. “I would find Jane hard to resist if she gave me anything to resist” he confided to friend Kingsley Amiss (who visited Wellington on several occasions)! Some twenty years later, those erstwhile encounters would provide the inspiration for the poem Wild Oats from the revered Whitsun Weddings collection.
Arrivals, Departures
Larkin harboured ambitions to leave Wellington from practically the moment he arrived but he was only finally able to resign his post at the end of August 1946 — after securing a job at the University Library, Leicester. While he joked that he’d have “missed it for anything”, his time spent in the town proved formative in so many ways, a fact Larkin would increasingly come to recognise in later years.
“Wellington glows with a particular lambency in my memory; it’s the only place I’ve ever done any work.”
In fact, he returned on at least three separate occasions, and in 1962 opened a modern extension to the library in Walker Street; the kind of public invitation he regularly avoided elsewhere. Later still, in 1977, Larkin wrote memorably about his years at Wellington for a Library Association article, contrasting his own lack of experience with the “graduate trainees of today” and wondering if there were still any librarians as unqualified as he had been. While he comforted himself that there probably weren’t, it was almost certainly Larkin’s very great fortune that he himself had been afforded such an opportunity.
Arrivals, Departures
Larkin harboured ambitions to leave Wellington from practically the moment he arrived but he was only finally able to resign his post at the end of August 1946 — after securing a job at the University Library, Leicester. While he joked that he’d have “missed it for anything”, his time spent in the town proved formative in so many ways, a fact Larkin would increasingly come to recognise in later years.
“Wellington glows with a particular lambency in my memory; it’s the only place I’ve ever done any work.”
In fact, he returned on at least three separate occasions, and in 1962 opened a modern extension to the library in Walker Street; the kind of public invitation he regularly avoided elsewhere. Later still, in 1977, Larkin wrote memorably about his years at Wellington for a Library Association article, contrasting his own lack of experience with the “graduate trainees of today” and wondering if there were still any librarians as unqualified as he had been. While he comforted himself that there probably weren’t, it was almost certainly Larkin’s very great fortune that he himself had been afforded such an opportunity.