An Arundel Tombb by Philip Larkin (Ft. Philip Larkin)
An Arundel Tombb by Philip Larkin (Ft. Philip Larkin)

An Arundel Tombb

Philip Larkin & Philip Larkin * Track #30 On The Whitsun Weddings

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An Arundel Tombb by Philip Larkin (Ft. Philip Larkin)

Produced by
Philip Larkin
Writed by
Philip Larkin
About

During a visit to Chichester Cathedral, Larkin came across a tomb dedicated to the Earl of Arundel, Richard Fitzalan and his wife Eleanor of Lancaster. This poem was written after the visit, an example of ekphrasis, that is a poem inspired by another work of art.

The poem explores themes of time, l...

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An Arundel Tombb Annotated

Side by side, their faces blurred,
The earl and countess lie in stone,
Their proper habits vaguely shown
As jointed armour, stiffened pleat,
And that faint hint of the absurd-
The little dogs under their feet.

Such plainness of the pre-baroque
Hardly involves the eye, until
It meets his left-hand gauntlet, still
Clasped empty in the other; and
One sees, with a sharp tender shock
His hand withdrawn, holding her hand.

They would not think to lie so long
Such faithfulnеss in effigy
Was just a detail friends would see:
A sculptor's sweet commissionеd grace
Thrown off in helping to prolong
The Latin names around the base.

They would not guess how early in
Their supine stationary voyage
The air would change to soundless damage,
Turn the old tenantry away;
How soon succeeding eyes begin
To look, not read. Rigidly they

Persisted, linked through lengths and breadths
Of time. Snow fell, undated. Light
Each summer thronged the glass. A bright
Litter of birdcalls strewed the same
Bone-riddled ground. And up the paths
The endless altered people came,

Washing at their identity,
Now, helpless in the hollow of
An unarmorial age, a trough
Of smoke in slow suspended skeins
Above their scrap of history,
Only an attitude remains:

Time has transfigured them into
Untruth. The stone fidelity
They hardly meant has come to be
Their final blazon, and to prove
Our almost-instinct almost true:
What will survive of us is love.

An Arundel Tombb Q&A

Who wrote An Arundel Tombb's ?

An Arundel Tombb was written by Philip Larkin.

Who produced An Arundel Tombb's ?

An Arundel Tombb was produced by Philip Larkin.

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