In both ‘The Sun Rising’ and ‘The Good Morrow’ Donne presents the experience of love, in a typical Metaphysical style, to engage his reader through sharing his own experiences. These poems show distinctive characteristics of Metaphysical poems which involve colloquial diction, drawing inventive imagery from unconventional sources, passionately analysing relationships and examining feelings. Donne presents the experience of love through conceits, Metaphysical wit, language techniques and imagery, in a confident tone using logical argument. The impact of Donne’s use of direct and idiomatic language shows the reader how he feels about a woman and ultimately love.
In ‘The Sun Rising’ the tone and the language Donne uses when interacting with the sun at the beginning of the poem is demeaning and powerful starting immediately with ‘Busy old fool, unruly Sun’, which shows Donne addressing the sun directly and perhaps scalding the sun for disturbing the sleeping lovers. Donne shows what the experience of love means to him by expressing his dislike for the sunrise of ultimately a new day, which represents the separation of the couple after spending the night together. In the first stanza Donne asks direct rhetorical questions which enquire about the sun’s existence ‘Must to thy motions lovers’ seasons run? This proves that Donne disagrees with the fact that the sun controls what the lovers do. It is also important to note that Donne uses a capital when addressing the ‘Sun’ as if it is personified and highlighting its importance in the poem. He continues to address the sun’s actions and is most reprimanding when he states ‘Go tell court-huntsmen that the king will ride’, suggesting that the sun should not disturb the couple as it is per...
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...ne exclusively on himself and his lover. By doing so he says the sun will be shining on the entire world. It is apparent in both poems the tone and language is dramatic, as this is typical of Donne’s writing style. His use of imagery and symbolism effectively present his experience of love. However it is the structure that builds up the emotion throughout the poems as Donne starts in each poem to refer to a seductive love, then in conclusion realises the importance of true love. ‘The Good Morrow’ clearly shows evidence of this when at the beginning Donne states he ‘suck’d on country pleasures childishly’ and in the end understands that a ‘Love so alike that none can slacken, none can die’.
With the equal weight of power on both his lover and Donne's part, the reader can begin to see a much more balanced relationship than before – when he was unsure about love.
critique the misogyny and misrepresentations of marriages put forth by male poets, such as John Donne,
Every writer leaves his mark, his imprint, in his writing; a thumb print left behind the ink if you know how to look for it, and Donne is no exception. The problem is extracting Donne’s imprint, and essence, from the poem, and understanding what that tells us about him. In one poem in particular this stands out, his Holy Sonnet IX, where Donne’s imprint lingers, giving another story behind the text, of his belief in God, but also his inner questioning, and confliction and doubt which come out as contradictions. Behind the text, Holy Sonnet IX, as Donne speaks through his speaker and poem, we come to understand that he is a religious man, though conflicted, which leads to doubt and contradictions, as he resents God in a way, while also just craving for his absolution and for him to forget and forgive his sins and wash them away, sins which weigh on him heavily and he believes taint him.
John Donne uses poetry to explore his own identity, express his feelings, and most of all, he uses it to deal with the personal experiences occurring in his life. Donne's poetry is a confrontation or struggle to find a place in this world, or rather, a role to play in a society from which he often finds himself detached or withdrawn. This essay will discuss Donne's states of mind, his views on love, women, religion, his relationship with God; and finally how the use of poetic form plays a part in his exploration for an identity and salvation.
Whether Donne wrote his poem for his wife or just touched a universal theme for of us to learn from, the huge apparent differences bring the mortal love between the speaker and his lady to a level of perfection and no journey can ever break that.
In 'Twickernham Garden ' Donne cleverly uses a spider as the conceit of the poem to comment on the nature of love, to emphasise that just like a spider love traps you insidiously and leaves you helpless. As well as that there is religious connotations to transubstantiation and manna and serpents. By doing this Donne finds another way to create an effective poem in emphasising his meaning and thoughts. The Major conceit in 'A Valediction Forbidding Mourning ' is that of a compass. Samuel Johnson a fellow poet, who coined the term metaphysical poetry criticised Donne by stating that 'the poem 's compass analogy highlights the violence used by metaphysical poets to force the most heterogeneous ideas together. Disagreeing with this statement, Donne 's use of the compass to reinforce the idea that their souls are like the legs of the compass, even though they will physically separate he will always come back as they create something perfect 'Thy firmness makes my circle just and make me end where I begun '. The conceit reassures his lover that it is inevitable that he will return because they are joined spiritually, mentally and physically, and their love is strong because he will always come back to
In 'Love's Alchemy,'; John Donne sets up an analogy between the Platonists, who try, endlessly, to discover spiritual love, and the alchemists, who in Donne’s time, tried to extract gold from baser metals. This analogy allows Donne to express his beliefs that such spiritual love does not exist and those who are searching for it are only wasting their time. Donne cleverly uses language that both allows the reader to see the connections between the alchemists and the Platonists and that allows for a more sexual interpretation of the piece.
I can imagine the poem being directed towards another person, rather than the sun. Because Donne personifies the sun, many of the things the speaker says could also be directed towards a human being, particularly someone that has tried to get in the lovers' way. I enjoyed this poem and wouldn't change anything else. I think that Donne used this particular structure in order to express his creativity. He wanted to write a love poem where the speaker wasn't speaking to his lover, like in the typical love poem. He wrote a poem that stands out from all the rest!
One of Donne's famous poetic devices is diction. Again in line one and ten appear "Mark" and "Oh stay." These words are denotations of strong causative voice in order to obtain mistress' attention. In addition to diction, another outstanding part is his rhetoric skill. For example, "Me it sucked first, and now sucks thee," (line 3). His using different ...
In the poem, Donne structures each stanza individually as a different personification of love. In the first stanza, Donne compares love to a plague when he says, “Yet not that love so soon decays…that I have had the plague…” (3/6) It is the latter line that Donne implements his use of imagery and conceit. Love is not often compared with “the plague” and this is a very strong interpretation. However while these two images seem different, they do interconnect through the pain and anguish that love can foster. This first comparison of Donne’s is very ef...
Each four-line section expounds upon one aspect of the Trinity- God the Spirit/God the Father/God the Son. Donne continually juxtaposes the explication of aspects of the Trinity with explication of man’s relationship to God, resulting in a high degree of conflation throughout. The first line opens with a simultaneous statement of doubt and faith, “Wilt thou love God, as He thee?” While the speaker is convinced of God’s love, he doubts his ability to reciprocate. This is in contrast to many of Donne’s other Holy Sonnets in which the speaker continuously implores ...
John Donne and William Shakespeare shared similar ideas to depict the theme of love in “Sonnet 18” and “The Good-Morrow”. Both Donne and Shakespeare used the concept of eternal love in their poems, but with slightly different perspectives. John Donne establishes the idea of eternal love by saying that his lover’s bodily fluids mixed with his create the perfect match. In other words, through coitus they become a whole perfect person free from death. “Love so alike that none do slacken, none can die.” (Donne 1374). On the other hand, Shakespeare establishes the idea of eternal love through his own poetry. “So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.” (Shakespeare 1173). Shakespeare, conceitedly, is determined that his poetry will last for centuries. As long as mankind can read, people will always know of their love. Shakespeare also establishes the concept of eternal love through summer. “But thy eternal summer shall not fade,” (Shakespeare 1173). Summers are eternal just like his love. Each of the poems also share the idea of temporary ownership. In “The Good-Morrow” John Donne makes a reference to the “Seven Sleepe...
...) This is one of the most important claims that Donne makes because he indirectly inducts himself and Anne into the canon of saints, thus making them sacred. The poem ends with Donne calling upon all those who have suffered from similar criticisms; this further dignifies Donne as a saint-like figure. Therefore, both of Donne’s latter poems expose the transformation that Donne acquires when he meets Anne. His sexist attitude and views transcend to a more spiritual and emotional one.
Concentration is one of the features of metaphysical poetry especially in Donne’s poetry because he introduces the readers to the new realm of argument and the closely interwoven thought, emotion and affection. We can find the communion of two souls of lovers into one existence in “The Ecstasy” where Donne intended to explain the different acts of love and the function of man as worthily performed man.
He compares his relationship with his love as “stiff twin compasses” and other similar comparisons to describe their unity (Dunne 26). Like a compass, they always seem to be working cohesively as one unit. It could have the same theme as “The Passionate Shephard to His Love” by Christopher Marlowe, the theme of love conquering all. They both seem to have an idealistic view to the relationship as well, as the shephard in Marlowe’s poem insists that his love “will all the pleasures prove” if she were to go with him (Marlowe 2). Both poems aim for a perfect life with their love, and Donne’s poem manages to come up with a more realistic option out of the
John Donne lived in an era when the lyric was at its pinnacle. Poets were writing well-rounded, almost musical poetry on subjects that ranged from all kinds of love to enchantment with nature. Donne could not help but revolt against this excess of fluency and melody. John Donne's style stands in such sharp contrast to the accepted Elizabethan lyrical style that it becomes difficult to accept the fact that his works date from the same era. To highlight this statement, one has to compare a typical Elizabethan lyric to one of Donne's works.