Larkin's Approach to Love and Change in in ‘Love Songs In Age’. Ella Lacey 12th Grade

The reader is immediately informed of the nature of the poem by the title: ‘Love Songs In Age’ promises a sense of progression, maturity and, naturally, love. The gentle, nostalgic tone Larkin develops is enhanced by the use of a third person narrative - ‘she’ is both universally applicable and distances the reader from the subject, in a manner that speaks of sympathy and age. The poem tells the story of a widow who rediscovers the songs of her youth and ponders the half-truths of the ‘much-mentioned brilliance [of] love’ they proclaim. She relishes the feeling ‘of being young’, but eventually comes to the conclusion that love had ‘not done’ what those songs had promised. The theme of the poem envelopes love, loss, and the innocence of youth, enabling the reader to understand the possibility of romance in the context of a worldly perspective.

The songs themselves held little emotional attachment for the woman, and have been kept simply because they took up ‘so little space’ and the covers ‘pleased her’. There is no depth to their presence and they are not treasured - they are ‘bleached’, ‘marked’ and ‘mended’ - so when they are put away in some hidden corner of her home, they are not missed, only rediscovered when ‘looking for...