Unnoticed in the Casual Light of Day Phillip Larkin and the Plain Style [Paperback]

Larkin's poems are often regarded as falling somewhere between the traditional 'plain' and the more contemporary 'postmodern' categories. This study undertakes a comprehensive linguistic and historical study of the plain style tradition in poetry, its relationship with so-called 'difficult' poetry, and its particular realization in the cultural and historical context of 20th-century Britain. The author examines the nature of poetry as a type of discourse, the elements of, and factors in, the development of literary styles, a close rhetorical examination of Larkin's poems within the described poetic frameworks, and his position in the British twentieth-century poetic canon.Acknowledgments  Introduction: Raising the Questions  1. Literature, Language, Plainness, and the Plain Style Traditions  2. Larkin in Context  3. Rhetorical Strategies I  4. Rhetorical Strategies II  5. Themes  Conclusion: Larkin's Own Blend  Notes.  Bibliography.  Index