Editing Andrew Motion (section)

==Early life==
[[File:Chapel, Radley College, 22-05-2007.jpg|thumb|left|[[Radley College]]]]
Motion was born on 26 October 1952<ref name=Debretts2005>{{cite book|title=Debrett's People of Today 2005|year=2005|edition=18th|isbn=1-870520-10-6|publisher=[[Debrett's]]|page=1176}}</ref> in London, to (Andrew) Richard Michael Motion (1921-2006),<ref name="Essex Clay 2018">''Essex Clay'', Andrew Motion, Faber and Faber, 2018, dedication page.</ref> a brewer at [[Allied Breweries|Ind Coope]],<ref name="independent.co.uk">{{cite web|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/a-plea-to-the-poet-laureate-743020.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220507/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/a-plea-to-the-poet-laureate-743020.html |archive-date=7 May 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|title=A plea to the Poet Laureate|first=Deborah|last=Ross|website=[[Independent.co.uk]]|date=11 October 2011}}{{cbignore}}</ref> and (Catherine) Gillian (née Bakewell; 1928–1978).<ref name="Essex Clay 2018"/><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/authorinterviews/9217384/World-of-Andrew-Motion-poet-novelist-and-biographer.html|title=World of Andrew Motion, poet, novelist and biographer|newspaper=[[The Daily Telegraph|The Telegraph]]|first=Angela|last=Wintle|date=20 April 2012 }}</ref><ref>Motion, Andrew, ''Philip Larkin: A Writer's Life'', Faber and Faber, 2018, p. xv, Introduction to the Second Edition.</ref><ref name=Ramblings/> Richard Motion was from a brewing dynasty; his grandfather founded [[Allied Breweries|Taylor Walker]], but by Richard Motion's time this had been absorbed by Ind Coope.<ref name="independent.co.uk"/> The Motion family were wealthy [[armigers]] who lived at [[Upton House, Warwickshire|Upton House]], [[Banbury]], [[Oxfordshire]], and were prominent in the local area; Richard Motion's grandfather Andrew Richard Motion was a [[Magistrate (England and Wales)|Justice of the Peace]] for [[Essex]], Oxfordshire and [[Warwickshire]], who had worked his way up from being a brewery labourer in the East End of London to ownership of his own successful brewery. When his children had grown up and married, he sold the Upton House estate and went to live at Stisted Hall, in Essex.<ref>''Armorial Families: A Directory of Gentlemen of coat armour'', seventh edition, A. C. Fox-Davies, Hurst & Blackett Ltd, 1929, vol. II, pp. 1400–1401.</ref><ref>''The Essex Review: An Illustrated Quarterly Record of Everything of Permanent Interest in the County'', collected vols. 41–43, E. Durant & Co., 1932, p. 44.</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.eadt.co.uk/news/mum-s-tragedy-ended-my-childhood-7474658|title = Mum's tragedy ended my childhood|date = 8 September 2006|work=East Anglian Daily Times}}</ref>

As a child, Motion lived in [[Kimpton, Hertfordshire]], and then in [[Hatfield Heath]]. He attended primary school in [[Much Hadham]], before attending [[boarding school]] at [[Maidwell Hall]]<ref name="In the Blood">''In the Blood'', Andrew Motion, Faber and Faber, 2006, p. 83.</ref> from the age of seven,<ref name="poetrymatters"/> joined by his younger brother.
When Motion was 12 years old, the family moved to Glebe House<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.greatbritishlife.co.uk/strolling-around-stisted-6925426|title = Strolling around Stisted| work=Great British Life |date = 13 January 2010}}</ref> at [[Stisted]], near [[Braintree, Essex|Braintree]] in Essex, where Richard Motion's grandparents had previously lived at Stisted Hall, by that time converted into a home for the elderly.<ref>''Burke's and Savill's Guide to Country Houses: East Anglia'', ed. Mark Bence-Jones, Burke's Peerage Ltd, 1981, p. 74.</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/gardening-mr-montefiore-s-time-capsule-1616841.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220507/https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/gardening-mr-montefiore-s-time-capsule-1616841.html |archive-date=7 May 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|title = GARDENING Mr Montefiore's time capsule|website = [[The Independent]]|date = 22 April 1995}}{{cbignore}}</ref><ref>''Burke's Family Index'', ed. Hugh Montgomery-Massingberd, Burke's Peerage Ltd, 1976, p. 111.</ref><ref name=Ramblings/> Most of his friends were from the school and so when Motion was in the village, he spent a lot of time on his own.<ref name=Ramblings/> He began to have an interest and affection for the countryside, and he went for walks with a pet dog.<ref name=Ramblings/> Later he went to [[Radley College]], where, in the [[sixth form]], he encountered Peter Way, an inspiring English teacher who introduced him to poetry – first [[Thomas Hardy]], then [[Philip Larkin]], [[W. H. Auden]], [[Seamus Heaney]], [[Ted Hughes]], [[Wordsworth]] and [[Keats]].<ref name="poetrymatters"/><ref Name="Profile">[https://web.archive.org/web/20110615124138/http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/article4748531.ece "Profile: Andrew Motion, the poet laureate"]. ''The Sunday Times''. 14 September 2008.</ref>

When Motion was 17 years old, his mother had a horse-riding accident and suffered a serious head injury requiring a lifesaving [[neurosurgery]] operation. She regained some speech, but she was severely paralysed and remained in and out of coma for nine years.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/5056194/Interview-with-Andrew-Motion.html |title=Interview with Andrew Motion|newspaper=The Daily Telegraph|date=30 March 2009|first=Mick |last=Brown}}</ref> She died in 1978 and her husband died of cancer in 2006.<ref name=Ramblings>{{cite episode |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01d2qf6 |title=Ramblings: Inspirational Walks: Sir Andrew Motion |series=Ramblings |network=[[BBC]] |station=[[BBC Radio 4|Radio 4]] |airdate=2012-03-17}}</ref> Motion has said that he wrote to keep his memory of his mother alive.<ref Name= "AM">[http://www.uktouring.org.uk/andrewmotion/books.htm Andrew Motion Official website] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121025232407/http://www.uktouring.org.uk/andrewmotion/books.htm |date=25 October 2012}} Accessed 12 July 2010</ref> When Motion was about 18 years old, he moved away from the village to study English at [[University College, Oxford]];<ref Name= "AM"/> however, since then he has remained in contact with the village to visit the church graveyard, where his parents are buried, and also to see his brother, who lives nearby. At university he studied at weekly sessions with [[W. H. Auden]], whom he greatly admired.<ref Name="Profile"/> Motion won the university's [[Newdigate Prize]] and graduated with a [[British undergraduate degree classification|first-class honours degree]].<ref name=Ramblings/> This was followed by an MLitt on the poetry of [[Edward Thomas (poet)|Edward Thomas]].