Philip Larkin - Required Writing: Miscellaneous Pieces 1955-1982

Miscellaneous Pieces 19551982

PHILIP LARKIN

The pieces collected here were, with one exception, produced on requestmostly, of course, as reviews, for it is an unexpected consequence of becoming known as a writer that you are assumed to be competent to assess other writers. But for every request complied with, several others were declined, for which either the time or the interest or the capability was lacking. It was, of course, flattering to be asked, but only up to a point: newspapers and magazines have to be filled, and if you wont do it someone else will. It is only the very prolific or the very needy who can afford to say yes to everything.

There is little coherence, therefore, in what is here reprinted. I have never proposed to an editor that I should write this article or review that book, so that what I produced was someone elses idea rather than my own. This is not to say that such tasks were undertaken lightly. A good reviewer combines the knowledge of the scholar with the judgement and cogency of the critic and the readability of the journalist, and knowing how far I fell short of this ideal made me all the more laboriously anxious to do the best I could. I have heard it said that anyone who has spent three years writing a weekly essay for his tutor finds literary journalism easy: I didnt. I found reading the books hard, thinking of something to say about them hard, and saying it hardest of all. That I persisted was due to the encouragement of friendly literary editors, in particular Bill Webb of the Guardian, Karl Miller of the Spectator, the New Statesman and the Listener (and now, of course, the London Review of Books ), and Anthony Thwaite of the Listener, the New Statesman and Encounter, and I should like to record my gratitude to them, reluctant though my response may have been at the time.

The piece written on my own initiative was the introduction to All What Jazz (1970), the collection of jazz record reviews I had written for the Daily Telegraph between 1960 and 1968. I had originally intended to publish that book privately, which is why it was printed by the now defunct firm Hull Printers; my publishers took it over only when I wrote asking if they would be prepared to distribute it. This may also account for the light-heartedly aggressive tone of what I wrote, and the enjoyment with which I wrote it. In fact I went on reviewing records until the end of 1971, and a few pieces from these last three years have been included along with the introduction.

Although I rarely accepted a literary assignment without a sinking of the heart, nor finished it without an inordinate sense of relief, to undertake such commissions no doubt exercised part of my mind that would otherwise have remained dormant, and to this extent they probably did me no harm. They are now reprinted because some of them have begun to be quoted out of context, and I should like to reiterate the latter, especially their dates. They will, I hope, also carry the rest, whose exhumation would otherwise hardly be justified.

Apart from minor verbal amendments, the pieces are reprinted as they first appeared. The order is chronological by date of publication except for the section Recollections, where the order is chronological by subject-matter.

P.L.

February 1982