Fresh perspective

If you are a fan of Philip Larkin’s work, as I am, just walking in to the Brynmor Jones Library at Hull University Library, where the famously lugubrious poet spent many years as chief librarian, is enough to elicit a nerdy thrill.

From now until October, however, there is another very good reason to visit. The excellent exhibition Larkin: New Eyes Each Year, a Hull UK City of Culture commission, offers a fresh new perspective on the writer, the man and his work. It brings together personal items, photographs, letters, books, drawings, clothing, souvenirs, music and film, many of which have never before been shown in public. “I came to this project with new eyes myself,” says curator Anna Farthing. “I didn’t know much about Philip Larkin other than his well known works. But creating an exhibition is rather like creating a poem with objects. The curator has to edit for sense and make bold choices.”

It is an intriguing show that incorporates elements of Larkin’s personal, professional and literary life, shedding light on his complex character and relationships, his friendships, with fellow writers such as Kingsley Amis and others, his family and interests. He was a prolific letter writer – he wrote to his mother Eva every day, many of those missives are on display – and the soundtrack playing jauntily in the background subtly references his well known love of jazz. The whole exhibition is set out as a library, complete with indexing, staying true to Larkin’s vocation – he always described himself as a librarian – and visitors can wander amongst the shelves making their own discoveries.

“For audiences, just as with reading poetry, there is no one right way to interpret an exhibition,” says Farthing. “I want everyone to have an individual response, and that will depend on their own memories, thoughts and feelings.  I hope that there is something of a hook for everyone, whether you know all the work by heart, or just that famous quote about your Mum and Dad.” 

Much has been written in recent years about Larkin’s private domestic arrangements – he was for some time maintaining relationships with three women, long-term partner Monica Jones, library colleague Maeve Brennan and his secretary Betty Mackareth – and for some, not unreasonably, that has coloured their feelings about his work. Whatever you may think about Larkin as a man – and there is plenty to be critical of – his lasting legacy is his poetry.

He understood that life can be messy, painful and complicated – his own was a prime example – and the beautifully succinct and searingly resonant way in which he expressed that in his poems endures. What is so interesting about this exhibition is that by focussing closely on Larkin’s possessions it may well bring more people to his poetry, which can only be a good thing.

“Through getting intimately involved with the objects that surrounded him at home and at work, I have come to understand something of his public lightness but also his private shadow, sadness and struggle,” says Farthing. “That struggle doesn’t excuse some of his attitudes, but nor does it in any way diminish his work. In fact it makes me appreciate it all the more. We can make great art from ordinary things.  Larkin knew that, and working creatively to make a display of his objects has reminded me of that too.”

Brynmor Jones Library, Hull University until October 1.