SpokenVerse | No Road by Philip Larkin (read by Tom O'Bedlam) @SpokenVerse | Uploaded November 2013 | Updated October 2024, 1 hour ago.
Larkin's solitary confinement and spiritual isolation were self-inflicted. He knew it. It reminds me of this remark, "Adulthood is the state of running away from the fears of childhood. Maturity is the state of looking back and wondering why you're running."
Maybe we should ask ourselves "What would you do differently, if you weren't so afraid?" I wonder what Larkin was so afraid of, that made him deprive himself of love and intimacy?
Paraphrase: "Since our trial separation nothing has changed, we just haven't been in touch. I could just come over and we'd go on as we were. But that gets more and more unlikely and, in time, will become impossible. Somebody else will take my place and then I will be free. There's something inside me that wants to be alone: it deliberately destroys any possibility of a relationship."
Our personality, meaning what we want, doesn't change much in our lifetime. Worms don't turn. All that changes is strategy, the means we use to get what we want. It's possible to adopt a different persona but our motivation stays the same. We're all looking for what will put our world to rights. In Larkin's case, it seems that what he really wanted was to be left alone with his misery.
Since we agreed to let the road between us
Fall to disuse,
And bricked our gates up, planted trees to screen us,
And turned all time's eroding agents loose,
Silence, and space, and strangers - our neglect
Has not had much effect.
Leaves drift unswept, perhaps; grass creeps unmown;
No other change.
So clear it stands, so little overgrown,
Walking that way tonight would not seem strange,
And still would be allowed. A little longer,
And time would be the stronger,
Drafting a world where no such road will run
From you to me;
To watch that world come up like a cold sun,
Rewarding others, is my liberty.
Not to prevent it is my will's fulfillment.
Willing it, my ailment.
Larkin's solitary confinement and spiritual isolation were self-inflicted. He knew it. It reminds me of this remark, "Adulthood is the state of running away from the fears of childhood. Maturity is the state of looking back and wondering why you're running."
Maybe we should ask ourselves "What would you do differently, if you weren't so afraid?" I wonder what Larkin was so afraid of, that made him deprive himself of love and intimacy?
Paraphrase: "Since our trial separation nothing has changed, we just haven't been in touch. I could just come over and we'd go on as we were. But that gets more and more unlikely and, in time, will become impossible. Somebody else will take my place and then I will be free. There's something inside me that wants to be alone: it deliberately destroys any possibility of a relationship."
Our personality, meaning what we want, doesn't change much in our lifetime. Worms don't turn. All that changes is strategy, the means we use to get what we want. It's possible to adopt a different persona but our motivation stays the same. We're all looking for what will put our world to rights. In Larkin's case, it seems that what he really wanted was to be left alone with his misery.
Since we agreed to let the road between us
Fall to disuse,
And bricked our gates up, planted trees to screen us,
And turned all time's eroding agents loose,
Silence, and space, and strangers - our neglect
Has not had much effect.
Leaves drift unswept, perhaps; grass creeps unmown;
No other change.
So clear it stands, so little overgrown,
Walking that way tonight would not seem strange,
And still would be allowed. A little longer,
And time would be the stronger,
Drafting a world where no such road will run
From you to me;
To watch that world come up like a cold sun,
Rewarding others, is my liberty.
Not to prevent it is my will's fulfillment.
Willing it, my ailment.
