By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
Philip Larkin wrote several poems about religion, such as ‘Church Going’, and memorably described it as a ‘vast moth-eaten musical brocade’ in ‘Aubade’. Larkin had a sceptical attitude to religion, being an atheist and self-described ‘Anglican Agnostic’ – like Thomas Hardy, Larkin had a fondness for the language and literature of the Anglican Church.