Look at two poems by Larkin that deal with our subjection to time and the painfulness of memory, and explore how he achieves his effects. (Love Songs in Age and Reference Back)

'Love Songs in Age' and 'Reference Back' are both poems by Philip Larkin that deal with the painfulness of memories and our subjection to time. In each, Larkin talks of the ways music can provoke memories, be it the sheet music 'Love Songs in Age', or the records in 'Reference Back'. The tone of the poems is very similar, with a negative opinion expressed in the final stanza of each poem, with 'Reference Back' dealing …

…but the length of the stanzas varies. In each stanza, however, the rhymes become half rhymes and the scheme deteriorates, from 'call' and 'hall' to 'lives' and 'perspectives'. The simplicity of the rhymes in the early part of the poem echoes Larkin's point that people romanticise the past in their memories and simplify it, so there is dissatisfaction with the present in comparison, which is shown by the more tenuous rhymes in the last stanza.