“In the later books I am much more at home in the use of language to describe things. I had never thought of that until a critic pointed that out.”
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The decision to write in prose instead of poetry is made more by the readers than by writers. Almost no one is interested in reading narrative in verse.
Philip Larkin has a tough honesty and sense of humor that I find irresistible, as a contemporary poet.
Teaching writing over the years intrudes on your own writing in important ways, taking away some of the excitement of poetry.
The great watershed of modern poetry is French, more than English.
