Poem Synopsis - Larkin

Question 1

Here

Answer 1

A train journey from industrial to rural life - isolated existence & passage of time.

Question 2

Mr Bleaney

Answer 2

Speaker in a dingy room and worries that he will meet the same fate of the trapped, solitary, dull existence of Mr Bleaney.

Question 3

Nothing to be Said

Answer 3

Explores the slow, inevitable approach to death - pointlessness of life.

Question 4

Love Songs in Age

Answer 4

Speaker rediscovers her old sheet music - reminder of the hope we had when we were young failing to transfer to adulthood.

Question 5

Broadcast

Answer 5

A love poem to Maeve Brennan - she was at the BBC symphony orchestra and he is at home listening, imagining her there in the crowd.

Question 6

Faith Healing

Answer 6

Faith is futile - human desire for cure of the pains of life - depicts a ceremony - women only allowed 20 seconds of contract with the priest but still seem to feel emotionally overturned.

Question 7

For Sidney Bechet

Answer 7

Poem addressed to Sidney Bechet and his love for his music.

Question 8

Toads Revisited

Answer 8

Delves into the complexities of everyday life - questions whether the drudgery of work is a necessary evil or a self-imposed limitation.

Question 9

Water

Answer 9

Larkin talks about creating his own religion and satirically centres water - critiques religion and its traditions suggesting its hollow and futile.

Question 10

The Whitsun Weddings

Answer 10

Train journey from Hull - observes the world around him and then on a wedding party - critiques the fact that this is only significant to them and no one else.

Question 11

Self’s The Man

Answer 11

Contrasts the speaker’s bachelorhood with the married life of a man named Arnold - feels that from an outsiders perspective Larkin seems selfish, but concludes that they are both just as selfish as one another.

Question 12

Take One Home For The Kiddies

Answer 12

Poem about animal rights and the cruelty of humanity - no one seems to care about their life or death they are simply toys.

Question 13

Days

Answer 13

Brief contemplation of life - days are meant for happiness, are cyclical in nature and people should cherish the present moment.

Question 14

MCMXIV

Answer 14

War poem - focuses on the importance of the changes England faced after WW2 - focuses on a picture of men who have just signed up to fight yet have no idea what’s about to happen to them.

Question 15

Talking in Bed

Answer 15

Depicts the difficulties a speaker has talking in bed with his lover - time can change everything - loneliness can invade the most intimate of moments.

Question 16

The Large Cool Store

Answer 16

Consumerism - Marks & Spencer - sells smart clothes we wear to work as well as nightwear we wear in order to escape the drab of every day life.

Question 17

A Study of Reading Habits

Answer 17

Reading used to provide the reader with a means to escape, yet now he is older it no longer does - he has to face the reality of the disappointments of life.

Question 18

As Bad As A Mile

Answer 18

Poet throws an apple core in the bin and misses - symbolic of failure.

Question 19

Ambulances

Answer 19

Exploration of the pervading sense of death that occurs in constrained societies - poem follows the route of an ambulance through rush hour in the city.

Question 20

The Importance of Elsewhere

Answer 20

Poem about cultural identity of the poet and how he struggles to live in a foreign land (Ireland)

Question 21

Sunny Prestatyn

Answer 21

Advertising & Vanity - how unattainable the perfect lifestyle is through the destruction of of an advertisement

Question 22

Dockery & Son

Answer 22

The speaker, a former student, revisits his old college and reflects on the changes that have occurred - Dockery, a former classmate who died young, now has a son who is a student at the same college.

Question 23

Wild Oats

Answer 23

Depicts the difficulties in a relationship Larkin had with Ruth Bowman & Jane Exhall.

Question 24

Essential Beauty

Answer 24

Deals with the gap between the advertising world and the real world - Larkin critically comments on the false hope the advertising world gives to people.

Question 25

Afternoons

Answer 25

A scene at a playground looking over Pearson Park - women have transitioned from their romantic youth to the responsibilities of parenting - does family life demand more sacrifice than its worth?

Question 26

An Arundel Tomb

Answer 26

Speaker observes a medieval tomb in Chichester Cathedral - couple shown holding hands - a reflection of love, time and mortality - Larkin believes love transcending death, however, is a stupid concept.