James Booth edited Philip Larkin's early girls'-school stories and poems as "Trouble at Willow Gables and Other Fictions" and has published two critical studies of the poet's work: "Philip Larkin: Writer" (1991) and"Philip Larkin: The Poet's Plight" (2005). He is Literary Adviser to the Philip Larkin Society and Co-Editor of its journal, "About Larkin". He recently retired from the Department of English at the University of Hull, where he had been a colleague of Larkin for seventeen years.