Poetry - Afternoons Flashcards
Who wrote Afternoons
Philip Larkin
Afternoons context
Solitary man who hated fame + didn’t want to attach himself to public literary life.
Restricted life, never married, didn’t travel abroad.
In the 1950s (Afternoons was written in England in 1959), women stayed at home doing domestic chores + most quit work once married to look after kids.
Afternoons form
1st stanza looks at Larkin’s cynical view of marriage + idea that young mothers = isolated. His use of language emphasises recurring theme of emptiness within young mothers + how regimented their lives have become.
2nd stanza Larkin moves to individual + describes mothers being alone with little support from working husbands.
3rd stanza Larkin goes onto children + how because of them, mothers = unable to live their own lives + they = merely looking in.
Their dreams, aspirations + needs have been put to side.
Afternoons structure
Has 3 eight line stanzas, with similarly short line lengths, a possible reflection of the regularity + formulaic pattern of everyday life.
Poems lacks a rhyming scheme, possibly meaning that everyday has no flair, or isn’t perfect enough to have a uniform pattern.
Enjambment quickens the flow to enhance how quick the change was from summer to autumn.
The stanzas = all same length = routine.
It’s a melancholy poem.
It’s unrhymed form reflects poem’s focus on unsatisfactory life of the young mothers.
Same amount of lines for each stanza (8). This is a traditional verse form with no rhyming. This could suggest that there’s no more romance in their lives.
“At swing and sandpit setting free their children”
Describes them being the controller of the kids, who want to be free + seek adventure with their ambition + curiosity, which the mothers no longer possess.
Sibilant alliteration shows the movement + happiness of the children compared to the parents who are simply ‘assembled’.
Emphasises children’s freedom, the mothers want freedom.
Sandpit = nature’s been trapped in a box just like the mothers
Swing = backwards + forwards never truly going anywhere, like the lives of the mothers + shows their repetitive routine.
“Behind them, at intervals”
Impersonal, ominous feeling this line creates through the use of the word “behind” rather than beside. As a result of this impersonal nature, it creates a division between the wives + husbands, and as if maybe the wives don’t feel supported.
However, “Behind” could suggest the husbands = there for support + comfort.
Could also imply how mothers = at the front of raising the children, maybe Larkin is praising mothers for their hard work.
Also seems they’re not interested in talking to each other.
It’s like they’ve lost the ability to communicate, + that there’s a disconnect between them + their children’s lives.
But the use of the word “intervals” hints at the idea that the husbands aren’t always there + so mothers = left on their own to look after themselves + children.
“their beauty has thickened”
The idea of time passing is developed throughout the poem - “their beauty has thickened” suggests ageing.
Larkin sees the young women as having lost the bloom of youthful beauty, there’s a change to their bodies, ‘thickening’ after childbirth. Some commentators see Larkin as misogynistic + cruel in these observations.
But it could also just symbolise how they may have become more beautiful, as their beauty has thickened, implying it has gotten bigger.
The adults are losing their youthful vigour = natural.
It could also show how the mothers have no time to look after themselves due to their kids, so it could be a metaphor for their mental health as well as physical ageing.
“Something is pushing them To the side of their own lives”
The last line “to the side of their own lives” echoes the idea of “setting free their children” from the 1st stanza.
There’s am implication that their lives = ruled by their children who “expect to be taken home”.
Could also say we see contrast in the children + parents who are almost trapped in their lives of adult responsibility + parenthood, compared to the young ones who are free.
Larkin seems to be complaining about the selfless nature of adulthood. That “something” is the responsibility assumed by adults raising children, maintaining livelihoods + keeping up social expectations which has ultimately caused them to abandon control over their own lives.
They have become sideline characters rather than the protagonist in deciding their own futures.
The deliberate ambiguity of “something” suggests there’s a mysterious force/compulsion, we don’t know who/what it is.
It could also be society’s expectations of the mothers, their husbands/children- multiple things could be responsible.
The word choice of “pushing”- suggests mothers have no choice but to comply, they’re not the central protagonist in their own story. “Lives” is plural suggesting it happens to all mothers.
Mothers don’t realise what’s pushing them = suggests they’re being forced away from their own lives.
Implies most important thing in their life = their kids, so mothers are almost at the side, now looking in on a life that isn’t theirs; a life they have no control over.
“The albums lettered Our Wedding, lying”
Reflective of the common disregard to marriage and passionless relationships.
-The wedding album, as a symbol for the love between couples, is now carelessly left out in the open. It suggests a increasingly distant relationship between couples as they move into adulthood. The impression is a wistful one - the albums as a symbol for a lost, romantic past.
-They’re telling a lie, they’re not happy anymore - broken wedding vows. The tape’s a lie now.
-It’s ignored now, as if it’s not important.
“From trees bordering”
Bordering also suggests order + confinement, contrasting to “setting free” in the last line. The trees aren’t representative of closeness to nature, but are likened to an imprisoning trap.
-The trees represent the mothers. They are putting aside their lives to look after their child.
-The mothers are trapped by their own lives and the children are a vision of their own past + memories.
-The trees are “bordering” = almost stopping the mothers escaping.
“Young mothers assemble”
There’s a sense of regimentation suggested by verb “assemble”. A pattern has been established + young mothers find company + maybe solace in coming to the playground. But this seems negative, as if it has become a tedious habit, rather than a pleasure. There’s an element of compulsion suggested, in that the mothers may not want to be there but must to give their children exercise.
-Word choice of ‘assemble’- element of compulsion, they are following orders, makes us think of school assembly, which in turn makes us think of the mothers being young.
-Adjective “young” suggests they themselves are still quite naive + inexperienced.
-Noun mothers seems to play quite an important part here.It could be argued that their identities have been stripped, now their most important role is being mothers.
-Verb assemble suggests regimental routine.Their lives have become boring + predictable. All of the excitement of ‘Summer’ is gone.
-They don’t want to be there + are forced to/have to by the kids.
“Stand husbands in skilled trades”
Implies a stereotypical relationship in which the fathers work as a tradesman whilst the mothers look after children at home. This usually entails the father having a smaller impact on the children that the mother.
-Males are introduced as ‘husband’ and ‘skilled trades’, not father, contrasts to their wives who were introduced as ‘mothers’. These are the most important parts of their lives, and they don’t have anything to do with looking after their child.
“Before them, the wind Is ruining their courting-places”
The steady erosive power of the wind is often used in literature as a metaphor for the effects of time. The destruction wreaked by the wind suggests that the once passionate lovers now have a relationship that is dutiful + lack-lustre.
-The parallelism of “behind them” + “before them”- the placement of the phrases on either side of stanza suggests the mothers are trapped in a bad life + can’t escape.
-“Winds of change”- woman changed because she had a child, she is now a mother watching her child play at the park, this is ruining the memories she has from when she went on dates to the park.
-Enjambment - no punctuation at the end of line 16 quickens the flow to represent how quick the change was.
-The wind may represent the children who are taking over their courting-places. They’re full of energy like the “wind”.
“But the lovers are all in school”
This indicates that, in Larkin’s view, romance is for the young people. Love is lost when you get older as the practicalities of child rearing + earning a living get in the way,
-This may also represents the cyclical nature of life. The lovers are no longer the parents but the children of the parents. It suggests, perhaps, that love is immature + fades in adult life.
-Larkin’s use of punctuation also shows that the ‘lovers’, the children are trapped, they are trapped in the school. Far away from adulthood which is a clever use of brackets.
“unripe acorns”
Imagery of “unripe acorns” represent potential to grow into something fuller + mature. The children = learning early the possibilities of life, which the mothers discarded when their children were born.
-The children are unripe, they’re unready for love, and are unaware of what adult life will be like = naive.
