Railway Poets

At Southwell library’s most recent writers live open mic’ session, Betjeman was recalled. Sir John was a prominent railway poet. The statue erected in his memory at St Pancras station pays tribute to his successful campaign to restore the station hotel building.

Philip Larkin is similarly associated with the railway through some of his poems, to the extent that his statue adorns the concourse at Hull Paragon station.

Perhaps less well-known is that Thomas Hardy was a prolific poet as well as a novelist and that he did not ignore the railway scene, either. His statue in Dorchester overlooks a busy roundabout.

 “……..And then, on the platform, she:

A radiant stranger, who saw not me.

I said, “Get out to her do I dare?”

But I kept my seat in my search for a plea,

And the wheels moved on. O could it be

That I had alighted there!”

[From Faintheart in a Railway Train, by Thomas Hardy]

Happened to us all at one time or another, surely?