Latest Events

A recording of our fantastic 21st September online event featuring Rosie Millard in Conversation with Sir Andrew Motion is now available to view on our YouTube channel. Click here

A recording of Philip Pullen’s talk, ‘The Importance of Elsewhere’, produced for the Belfast International Arts Festival, is also now available to view on the BIAF YouTube channel as well as on the PLS YouTube channel

Talks given at  joint conference with the Betjeman Society held in Leicester entitled ‘A Coming Together of Sorts: the collaborative adventures of John Betjeman and Philip Larkin’ can also be viewed  on the PLS YouTube channel.

A final ‘High Tea and Poetry‘ afternoon will be held in the James Reckett Reading Room in Hull Central Library on  8th December. These have proved to be highly enjoyable afternoons spent in the glorious surroundings of Central Library’s James Reckitt Reading Room in the company of two of Hull’s best poets. Reading poems, telling stories and enjoying delicious food and drink. Places are limited for the final event and need to be booked via this link

December 2nd is going to be another massive day in the Centenary calendar, with events taking place in London, Coventry and Hull.

The annual commemorative PLS event on 2nd December, the day Larkin died in 1985, will this year take place in Westminster Abbey. Details are still being worked on. It will include Evensong and a short ceremony in Poets’ Corner and will include readings of poems. This event is now fully booked.

On the same day in Coventry, Larkin’s home city, a blue plaque will be unveiled at his birthplace, 2 Poultney Road by the Lord Mayor of Coventry. We are grateful to the Coventry Society for their tremendous support in helping us to achieve this long-standing goal. Following on from this, at 7.00 PM in Stoneleigh Church Sheila Wolf, a previous Head of English at Larkin’s school, King Henry VIII in Coventry, will be giving a talk on Larkin’s poetry which is free to attend. Full details can be found here. 

In Hull, the 2nd December will see the launch of a very special Larkin installation at Hull Central Library curated by the film maker Zsolt Balogh. Zsolt’s installations for Hull2017 were real highlights of the City of Culture year and this new indoor installation promises to be something very special indeed and will run until 21st December.

Blake Morrison will be giving a talk about Larkin for ULEMLA – the University of London Extra-Mural Literature Association – at 11am on Saturday December 3rd, at the Crowndale Centre, 218 Eversholt Street, London, NW1 1BD (two minutes’ walk from the Mornington Crescent Northern Line tube). All welcome.

The PLS Conference, ‘Bad habits of expectancy’, will take place at the University of Hull on 8th -9th December. We are very pleased to host an academic conference which aims to present current thinking about Larkin and his contemporaries in a lively and interactive programme, including keynote speaker and leading Larkin commentator, Rachel Cooke. Full details can be found here. 

And there is bound to be more! In fact, we are planning something very special during the final few months of the year. Be sure to keep a close eye on our website, Twitter and Instagram accounts for updates and announcements.

In addition, the new PLS YouTube Channel will continue to post content relating to various Larkin places, as well as recordings of some of the Larkin100 talks and lectures. We are hoping to upload a lot more video content generated by members and followers: we encourage contributions to be sent to us via the email address Larkin100.online@gmail.com.

Philip Pullen
Chair, Larkin100

New PLS Merchandise

It’s that time of year again, looking ahead to Christmas and New Year, and the PLS have just released two new excellent items for our online shop. Following on from the success of this year’s centenary wall calendar (which sold out), we have designed a charming A5 desk calendar to see you through 2023, in conjunction with our friends in Sheffield, Volta Creative. This time we celebrate the wonderful Larkin doodles taken from his letters, that reflect Larkin’s domestic concerns- from cutting down on the booze to dreading the next Budget- all things we can sympathise with still! Some of these have never been published before.

 

If you were a student back in the 1980s or 90s, you will surely remember Viz magazine- the Geordie institution that took a love of vintage ‘Beano’ style comics and brought them up to date with funny, often outrageous, jokes. Viz is still going strong today, and one of their long standing artists (and great Larkin fan) Davey Jones has kindly given us this image to turn into a high quality A4 print. Davey has never had his artwork used as merchandise before so we are very proud of this world exclusive! Perfect for an office wall or a stocking filler for a Larkin (or Viz) fan.

 

We still have the ever popular Christmas cards and snowy images of Larkin’s two Hull homes in Pearson Park and Newland Park, by Hull artist Tony Denison, as well as postcards, t-shirts, posters, tea towels, pencils and books. All purchases help support our charitable aims and are very much appreciated.
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