Talking In Bed Analysis

Talking in bed ought to be easiest
Lying together there goes back so far
An emblem of two people being honest.

Yet more and more time passes silently.
Outside the wind's incomplete unrest
builds and disperses clouds about the sky.

And dark towns heap up on the horizon.
None of this cares for us. Nothing shows why
At this unique distance from isolation

It becomes still more difficult to find
Words at once true and kind
Or not untrue and not unkind.

.: :.

Analysis of a Poem
Philip Larkin's poem 'Talking in Bed' is very simple poetry at its best. It tells the truth about life and what relationships can gradually descend into over time. It explores the theme that no matter how close we are to someone, we can still experience intense depths of loneliness. The poet uses pathetic fallacy to convey this somewhat intangible and ironic loneliness through his imagery and tone of the poem. The language emphasises the feelings of what an empty marriage may feel like. The poem also gives the impression it is from the male's perspective. The poem is written in four stanzas, each with three lines of usually ten syllables apiece. This makes it a short lyrical ballad. These types of poems are used mainly to express a certain feeling of the protagonist, which is achieved through the tone, the language, and the imagery. There are many examples of imagery in this poem, all of which show two people in bed, lying close to each other but somewhat distant in their relations as they realise how much they have changed; 'Lying together there... an emblem of two people being honest. Yet more and more time passes silently.' The imagery in those few lines is so strong in what it depicts.

He accurately depicts the mood and the tone of the poem through his use of simple, yet dark language that transcend the page it is written on and into the minds and bodies of those reading it. " This must be one of the most depressing ideas and truths of today's society; which adds to the poems melancholic tone. This affects the reader in such a way that they start to question their own relations with the people they love. Instead it continues in its line of thought progressively from the start to the finish, and at the end the reader is left with an overall feeling of melancholy or sorrow. It is these devices which not necessarily tell the emotions of the poet, but express them through symbols and metaphors. All relationships reach a point where one day you will be in bed together and you will not be able to talk about the things that you used to talk about. The poet doesn't answer that question. It is almost saying that one day you will wake up with your partner of many years, and not know who they are. The poem itself proceeds in a logical form from the first stanza through to the fourth. In the first stanza, the poet hints that the couple involved have been together for quite some time; "Lying together there goes back so far". It has a very powerful message for everyone that reads it, and because the language is so simple, it is even more effective in getting that message across. The reader would imagine that the feeling they experience at the end of the poem must be how the poet would feel while lying in bed with his lover, unable to express himself as "more and more time passes silently".

| Posted on 2009-04-04 | by a guest