Ms

“Church Going” by Philip Larkin is a compelling poem.

Firstly, the first 2 stanzas describe the visit to the particular church. The narrator’s purpose and attitude is made clear in the first line: “once I am sure there’s nothing going on”. This shows that the narrator is someone who is in church more out of curiosity than religion matter. Also this immediately differentiates him from others. The narrators’ attitude is reinforced by Larkin’s word choice, it’s just “another church”, one form many he has visited, and therefore there is nothing especial he hasn’t seen before. His descriptions of religious objects as “little book”, and the alter as, “the holy end”. This demeans the sanctity of the church. In addition, he wonders whether the roof of the church has been “cleaned or restored”, commenting that “someone would know: I don’t” this highlights out his lack of interest. Also in his donation of an “Irish 6pence” reflects back that the church was not worth stopping for.

The technique features of these stanzas convey a feeling of boredom. Larkin’s use of rhythm in these stanzas is made slow and jerky with the use of punctuation, mid-stops and enjambment: “and little books, sparking of flower, cut”. This has no flow and has an unenthusiastic dissolution tone.

Nevertheless, stanza 3 “yet stop I did: in fact I often do”. This shows a clashing conjunction and short vowels, which provides a clear change of tone and purpose. The 3 reflective and questioning stanzas that follow, are linked to the title; that there is a sense in which this is a meditation about how the church вЂ?is’ going out of use in the modern world. These stanzas come in the form of series of questions, which have possible answers to them. Owing to the fact that churches in the future would be meaningless; Larkin suggests this, creating a list of “grass, weedy pavement, brambles, buttress sky”. This shows how worthless and meaningless they’ll be. And questions who will be the last person to visit a church as a church: a “ruin-bibber” or a “Christmas addict”.

In addition, stanza 5 suggests that the last visitor to a church will be someone like the narrator himself, which leads us to the final 2 stanzas. Where Larkin examines the remaining significance of churches and why he goes to them. The narrator is “bored, uninformed” but he still goes to church due to the fact that church once had significance but they don’t. The design of church “cross on ground”, is a deliberate design, (seen from above, many churches, especially traditional ones, are in the shape of a cross), a deliberately designed and fashioned artifact; this contrasts with the surrounding “suburb scrub”.