Jean Hartley (c.1968)
Jean Hartley’s wonderful Philip Larkin, The Marvell Press and Me (reissued in Finds) tells a tale of one woman’s love of literature – bound up with intellectual curiosity, cultural entrepreneurialism and perseverance against the odds – that is altogether worthy of an engrossing drama. And now the book has had its due, for the esteemed Hull Truck Theatre Company have just mounted a stage adaptation of Jean’s memoir, entitled Wrong Beginnings and penned by David Pattison. The Yorkshire Post‘s Stephen McClarence last week offered an excellent, funny and illuminating interview with Joan about her life, her book, and its continued currency which testifies not only to the enduring greatness of Larkin but also to the fine manner in which she narrated her own inspiring story. I quote:
“It was 1955 and Jean and her then-husband George, both in their early twenties, had already published some of Larkin’s work in Listen, a shoestring poetry magazine they ran from their home, a two-up, two-down between a chip shop and a beer-off in Hessle, near Hull. All previous contact had been by post, but now there was talk of publishing a book of Larkin’s poems, so he came to see them. “He probably thought we were going to be middle-class, well-established grown-ups and then he arrived and found a little hovel, ill-furnished, poverty-stricken, certainly not a provincial version of Faber and Faber,” she recalls. “But he could see that here were two very idealistic young people who felt as passionately about poetry as he did”… It was a successful meeting, resulting in The Less Deceived, the collection in which Larkin found his poetic voice and which made his reputation.”
