Pretending To be Me

Wednesday, 9th February 2011

Tickets are running out the door for Pretending To Be Me,

An intimate, acerbic and searingly honest show about the poet, jazz aficionado and Hull University librarian, Philip Larkin. Written by and starring the acclaimed Oscar-nominated Sir Tom Courtenay for one night only at Garter Lane Theatre on Thursday 10th February at 8pm, limited tickets remain on 051-855038 or www.garterlane.ie.

Larkin ('the magnificent Eeyore of British verse' - Daily Telegraph) has moved home; surrounded by packing cases, playing selections from his favourite jazz LPs, and making himself cups of tea - and later whiskies - he reflects wryly on his upbringing and life as a poet. Hilarious and moving, the narrative shifts seamlessly between Larkin's outrageous wit and the poems, which Courtenay reads with powerful directness and simplicity.

Philip Larkin almost uniquely turned down the offer of a Poet Laureateship and was truly one of the foremost figures in 20th-Century English poetry.

The reclusive and oft misunderstood poet feared his epitaph would be, as his famous opening lines in one of his poems declare: 'They f*** you up, your mum and dad' but Sir Tom Courtenay beautifully demonstrates through the poet's work that his true and endearing legacy far from being negative is an evocation of the very best of the human spirit.

Tom Courtenay received Oscar nominations for his performances in the films Dr Zhivago and The Dresser. He has made numerous appearances on television. His memoir "Dear Tom: Letters From Home" was published to considerable critical acclaim and comprises a selection of the letters exchanged between Courtenay and his mother, with his own recollections of life as a young student actor in London, in the early 1960s. www.garterlane.ie