The Whitsun Weddings collection information

Philip Larkin Biography

Potential exam questions for Phillip Larkin poems

1. H. Bertens- 'mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social, political and intellectual life'. Using ideas from the critical anthology and The Whitsun Weddings poetry collection by Phillip Larkin to what extent to you agree with this view?
2. H. Bertens- 'It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness'. Using ideas from the critical anthology and The Whitsun Weddings poetry collection by Phillip Larkin to what extent to you agree with this view? 
3. H.Bertens- 'capitalism alienates them from themselves by seeing them in terms of prouction- as production units, as objects rather than human beings. Capitalism turns people in things, it reifies them.' Using ideas from the critical anthology and The Whitsun Weddings poetry collection by Phillip Larkin to what extent to you agree with this view?(Chosen question) 

The Hollow Men T.S. Eliot

Passivity 
The Hollow Men have been damned for their cowardice and weakness of will, symbolised by "the Shadow. A marxist would argue that it is better to either follow good or evil then to be submissive. To do nothing and to remain submissive is pointless. Make sure you do at least something in your life whether it is good or bad compared to doing nothing because then you are participating and go to either hell or heaven rather then remaining in the Shadows. The Hollow Men are "Walking alone" and in a state of limbo meaning a state of nothing. Their neither in heaven nor hell, life nor death, they purely exist for eternity.  A marxist believes that it is our duty to challenge and not to remain in a false consciousness which must question the unfair capitalist society and status quo to prevail against it. To simply do nothing is not good enough. A Marxist strongly believes that we must have some purpose in our life and strife towards either good or bad. The Hollow men are stuck between life and death and hell and heaven, they did not pick a side and did not become active. "This is the way the world ends"

Philip Larkin Exam Question

Marxism question answers

• Marx and Engels viewed literature as insignificant.
• The sociology of literature concerns itself with what might be called the means of literary production, distribution and exchange in that particular society. 
• Matisse believed about all art bears the imprint of historical epoch but that great art is that in which this imprint is most deeply marked.
• Marxism criticism is original as if focuses on the revolutionary  understanding of history itself.
• Art is part of the superstructure because it is an element in the complex structure of social perception which ensure that the situation in which one social class has power over the other is either seen by both members of society see as 'natural' or not seen at all.
• From Conrad's work the crisis of the western bourgeoisie class is that the permission of Conrads world view is rather a unique transformation of art into a ideological pessimism rife in his period- a sense of history as cynical and futile, as individuals as impenetrable and solitary, of human values relativistic and irrational, which marks a drastic crisis in the ideology of the wester bourgeoisie class which Conrad associated himself with.
• The four elements of unity in Marxism include text, ideology, social relations and levels of society.
• Engels letter to Joseph Bloch, Engels wanted to deny about the base and superstructure that there is any mechanical, one to one correspondence between base and superstructure; elements of the superstructure constantly react back upon and influence the economic base.
• Marx believes we enjoy classical Greek literature as it is a nostalgic lapse back into our childhood. 

The Cool Store by Phillip Larkin

The Cool Store by Phillip Larkin

Marxism

Marxism Criticism