Home and Homelessness: Crisis of Existence in Philip Larkin’s Poetry

Abstract

A great deal of Philip Larkin’s poetry suffers from a tension between belonging with and estrangement from home. Larkin’s writing career flourished at a time in the mid-20^th century when British thought and feeling underwent tremendous changes due to the Second World War. Larkin, England’s Unofficial Poet Laureate, remains tied to regional or national identities throughout his life. Larkin is often called a poet of Englishness. Larkin’s protagonists are somewhat constitutive of the poet’s own personality. Larkin persona fails to feel a sense of belonging to his childhood hometown Coventry when he returns there after a decade because it creates in him no nostalgia. The place where he was born and grew up does not have any impact on his memory and thus he feels estranged from his former existence. Larkin moved from one place to another as he held the posts of librarian in different colleges or universities. For Larkin ‘nowhere is really home to me’, as he wrote to Monica Jones after living in Hull for fifteen years. Larkin refused to be bound by belonging to his place of temporary staying. Belonging to a place is not necessarily a choice for Larkin but often an unavoidable option. For a Larkin speaker possessing a rented room, which is nothing but ‘one hired box’, causes in him a crisis of belonging. This paper will aim to explore Larkin’s ambivalent feelings of belonging and non-belonging towards home in some of his poems.