Essential Beauty - A poem by Philip Larkin

In frames as large as rooms that face all ways And block the ends of streets with giant loaves, Screen graves with custard, cover slums with praise Of motor-oil and cuts of salmon, shine Perpetually these sharply-pictured groves Of how life should be. High above the gutter A silver knife sinks into golden butter, A glass of milk stands in a meadow, and Well-balanced families, in fine Midsummer weather, owe their smiles, their cars, Even their youth, to that small cube each hand Stretches towards. These, and the deep armchairs Aligned to cups at bedtime, radiant bars (Gas or electric), quarter-profile cats By slippers on warm mats, Reflect none of the rained-on streets and squares They dominate outdoors. Rather, they rise Serenely to proclaim pure crust, pure foam, Pure coldness to our live imperfect eyes That stare beyond this world, where nothing's made As new or washed quite clean, seeking the home All such inhabit. There, dark raftered pubs Are filled with white-clothed ones from tennis-clubs, And the boy puking his heart out in the Gents Just missed them, as the pensioner paid A halfpenny more for Granny Graveclothes' Tea To taste old age, and dying smokers sense Walking towards them through some dappled park As if on water that unfocused she No match lit up, nor drag ever brought near, Who now stands newly clear, Smiling, and recognising, and going dark.

Poet: Philip Larkin
Poem: Essential Beauty
Volume: The Whitsun Weddings
Year: Published/Written in 1962

Comment 2 of 2, added on June 1st, 2006 at 4:42 AM.

Actually, at a recent lecture I attended by Andrew Motion and, more insightfully, James Booth, professor of English at the University of Hull, he said that this particular poem is an example of what he termed 'Anti-irony.'

This is due to the fact Booth interprets Larkin's voice as one full of admiration and quiet optimism for people in this poem. Larkin's voice conveys a sense of admiration for people striving for the perfection the advertisement industry portrays, but laments the fact that, inevitably, they will never be able to obtain it.
Therefore, although on first evaluation of the poem one might think that the title is merely ironic, on re-evaluation, it appears that, after all, the title appears more apt than previously thought.

A beautiful poem if you choose to interpret it in this light; well, a beautiful poem nonetheless, but it adds a greater sense of poignancy for me.

Walker from United Kingdom

Comment 1 of 2, added on March 30th, 2006 at 9:10 AM.

I think this poem has a great deal of relevance in our modern age and I'm surprised that nobody has commented on it yet. Larkin has highlighted the disparity between the world portrayed in advertising and the world of it's victims who live in poverty. Published in 1962 but we've got pensioners scrimping by, smokers dying, and a young man vomiting in a pub. These are all social problems that have only worsened in the intervening years, as advertising has become ever more prevelant.

Kat from United Kingdom

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