Donne's Use of Personification

381 Words1 Page
bulb-icon

Recommended: Death and dying in different religions

There are many literary devices at the disposal of writers that are used to emphasize ideas. In his sonnet "Death, be not proud", John Donne chooses to use personification. He personifies death in order to emphasize the idea that Christians have victory over death, and the promise of eternal life, where death is no more.

In the first four lines of the poem, the speaker tells Death that even though some have though him to "mighty and dreadful", he is not. The reason he is not is that those he thinks he has dominion over do not actually die. The speaker emphasizes this saying that neither can Death kill him. Death cannot kill him because of his faith in Christ. This idea can be found in the Bible. In 1 Corinthians 15:50-57, the Apostle Paul asserts that at the return of Christ there will be a resurrection from the dead, where the perishable will be changed to imperishable. Since death is a permanent concept, Death cannot kill those in Christ, as they will be resurrected.

In lines 5-8, Donne elaborates on the concept of victory over death. He compares Death to rest and sleep, saying that rest and sleep are smaller copies of Death. This again speaks to the impermanence of death. Because of the hope of resurrection, death is merely a prolonged sleep for the bodies, and a deliverance of the soul into eternity. This then is actually more pleasurable than sleep, and many men have been eager to embrace Death, ready to receive their inheritance in Christ.

In lines 9-12, Donne speaks to death in a way that is belittling. It is as if he were trying to make Death feel small and inadequate. Death is told that he is a slave to chance and to certain men, and that he dwells with poison, war and sickness. The speaker is referring to the fact that killing can happen at the will of someone other than Death. The speaker then informs Death that drugs are able to make us sleep as well if not better than the sleep of Death. Why then is Death proud ("why swell'st thou then"), he asks, implying that Death has nothing to boast in. This all shows the powerlessness of Death.

The final two lines of the poem are simply a summation of all the ideas that have been brought to mind in the rest of the poem.

Show More
Related

  • Analysis: Forbidding Mourning, Holy Sonnet 10, And Meditation 17

    896 Words  | 2 Pages

    While this may at first seem to counter the idea that death is an elevation, it is in fact complementary. For when Donne said that "any man's death diminishes me," the emphasis is not on death, but on man. Each person's death is the loss of a chapter from the book of life, and because each and every person shares that very volume, that loss affects everyone. Temporarily, their book is less magnificent; humanity as a whole has lost that person's contributions, thoughts, identity, and feelings. But the second implication rectifies this seemingly bleak answer to life's riddle: Everyone of the church will reunite in the end, and all of humanity's splendour shall come together again. Incidentally, this is also where Meditation 17 converges upon the first

    Read More

  • Similarities Between Death Be Not Proud And The Book Thief

    454 Words  | 1 Pages

    In the poem Death Be Not Proud and The Book Thief the deception of death is dissimilar. In Death Be Not Proud the poet is insulting death. One example of this “Some have called thee Mighty and dreadful for thou art not so.” In that quote he is saying that don't think you are powerful because you are not. In The Book Thief death is the narrator, and death does not interpret himself as evil. For example, Death has real feelings. He experiences both sadness and joy in the novel. Personification is what makes them dissimilar. In the poem the personification of death creates a feeling that death is less powerful than we think. He undermines death by stating that he subject to the rules of "fate, chance, kings, and desperate men." Death is also personified as a slave that has many masters, which limits the people he takes. In the book death is personified as cheerful affable amiable and agreeable. Going against John Donne's portrayal of death as a coward. In The Book Thief death is quite observant colors and is not just dark and evil. As shown in this quote “People observe the colors of a day only at its beginnings and ends, but to me it's quite

    Read More

  • The Jewish Cemetery By Henry Longfellow Figurative Language

    874 Words  | 2 Pages

    He quotes them stating, “Blessed be God for he created Death!…and the Death is at rest and peace…And giveth Life that nevermore shall cease” (Lines17-20). The audience can easily decipher through this quote that the mourners did not harbor anger or an attitude of bitterness. Rather, the mourners obtain an attitude of acceptance. The tone in this quote remains the same as it does throughout the poem. Therefore, the audience can tell that the mourners’ perspective of death was not positive, but at the very same circumstance, they understood it was something out of their control, in which they transferred their emotions to God by praising Him (Line

    Read More

  • Death In Giovanni's Room By James Baldwin

    783 Words  | 2 Pages

    When you die you no longer have control of your body or your thoughts. Thus, many people are afraid of death. In this novel, the idea of death seems to be associated with the idea of not being able to be who are truly are and not being able to do what you want to do. The main character David, has a hard time accepting his sexual orientation and his relation with people around him. He is not really himself with his father and instead pretends to be whom and what his father wants him to be to make his father believe that their relationship is okay. He also ashamed of being gay and hides it from his father as well. For David, the idea of death seems to represent how, even though he is alive he is really dead because he can’t allow himself to be who he really is. In addition to David, death is also used in Hella’s case as well. For instance, Hella mention, ““...I’m beginning to think that woman get attached to something by default. They’d give it up, if they could, anytime, for a man…But I think it kills them –perhaps I mean…’that it would have killed me’…” (Baldwin) In this instanst, death was not used directly, but the word kill seems to implied the same idea of being dead even though you are alive because you are not truly doing what you really want or being who you really are. In Hella’s case she did not seem to really want to get marry and was suspecting that something was up with David, but ends up coming back to David nonetheless because it is typical for a woman to set down with a family in

    Read More

  • Explication of John Donne's The Flea

    406 Words  | 1 Pages

    Based on her reaction, the speaker states, "Tis true...Just so much honor, when they yield'st to me, Will waste, as this flea's death took life from thee."  In other words, he twists his argument to make the point that the woman will lose as much giving herself to him as she lost killing the flea - NOTHING!  Secondly, Donne's use of rhythm aids in shaping the poem's meaning.  The poem has alternating lines of iambic tetrameter and pentameter.  However, Donne varies this rhythm to create emphasis on particular words or phrases.  For instance, in the first stanza he states, "Mark but this flea, and mark in this." Instead of beginning with an unstressed word or syllable as in iambic, Donne stresses the word "Mark."  This is important in accentuating his argument.

    Read More

  • Comparing Death in Do not go gentle into that good night and Death Be Not Proud

    923 Words  | 2 Pages

    Both "Do not go gentle into that good night" and "Death Be Not Proud" see death as an opponent; however, one sees it as an adversary that is already defeated while the other sees it as an enemy that must be defeated. In "Death Be Not Proud" Donne says "those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow / Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me"(lines 3-4). This passage shows Donne's belief that people will always overcome death. In Thomas' poem, he writes "Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright / Their frail deeds might have danced in the green bay, / Rage, rage against the dying of the light" (7-9). Even the "good men" are in the end defeated by death according to Thomas.

    Read More

  • Vulnerability in the Works of John Donne

    2695 Words  | 6 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • Holy Sonnet 10

    956 Words  | 2 Pages

    John uses many examples of figurative language in his sonnet. To begin with, when Mr. Donne first commences his poem, he uses the personification “Death, be not proud” (1). The author is giving death the human characteristics of being “not proud.” The rest of the line continues as “though some have called you thee. ” Death should not be prideful even if people think it is. John displays through this first line how he feels about death: he is too prideful for his own good. Furthermore, Donne uses another personification when he states “Mighty and dreadful, for thou are not so” (2). Again, he is giving death, a concept not a human, real characteristics. He believes death is not “mighty” or “dreadful” but something else. It gives his opinion that death is not “dreadful” to people in their lives but possibly beneficial. Later, the poet says “Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men” (9). Death is merely being controlled by things like fate which is the only way he can act. He has no way to move on his own without these other forces. Like with war, death is the result not the cause: death cannot physically make people fight. This comparison devalues death in its importance and therefore its necessity. John Donne’s use of metaphors and personifications in his poem to emphasize his belief that death is not as bad as people or death thinks it really is but can actually be advantageous.

    Read More

  • Division of the Body and Soul in John Donne's "The Funeral" and "Sonnet 3"

    1192 Words  | 3 Pages

    John Donne's "The Funeral" and "Holy Sonnet 3" are undeniably similar in their discussions of the separation of the body and soul. Each poem deals directly with the idea of death and afterlife. However, the topic of death is referred to not as an ending but more of as a beginning to a new life, exclusively for the soul. Each poem reflects the soul being released from the body as a way of cleansing the spirit while allowing the mind to rid itself of things that might have troubled the speaker while living. Through death the soul is given a second life, free of previous concerns and with new virginity to the blessings of the afterlife.

    Read More

  • Interpretation of A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning

    1035 Words  | 3 Pages

    In arguing against mourning and emotional confusion, Donne uses a series of bold and unexpected comparisons for the love between himself and his lady. Donne makes his first surprising analogy in the first stanza when he compares the approaching separation of the lovers to death. "he speaker compares his parting from his lover to the parting of the soul from a virtuous man at death. According to the speaker, "virtuous men pass mildly away" (line 1) because the virtue in their lives has assured them of glory and happiness in the afterlife; therefore, they die in peace without fear and emotion. By this he suggests that the separation of the lovers is parrallel to the separation caused by death.

    Read More

  • An Analysis of "The Sun Rising," by John Donne

    798 Words  | 2 Pages

    The tone and emotion of the poem changes as the speaker goes on. The first stanza of the poem convey...

    Read More

  • A Restoration of Power: Metaphor, Simile, and Imagery in Donne's "Batter My Heart"

    663 Words  | 2 Pages

    Granted that Donne's personification of God reduces the deity from an almighty force to a human archetype, divinity is not undermined. The metaphoric figures of inventor, ruler, and lover, each retain specific skills and purpose, but can not compare to the Christian suggestion of God's role and strength. However, the presentation of striking, violent imagery charges the poem with a sense of power and complete domination, and allows the image of God to transcend his designated human forms. Through the projection of life's frailty, powerlessness in captivity, and sexual

    Read More

  • Critical Analysis Of Donne's 'To His Mistress Going To Bed'?

    1068 Words  | 3 Pages

    In Donne’s poems, particularly his early love poems Donne explains how love involving the body aids the soul in gaining redemption from God. This perspective may be observed in Donne’s poem, To His Mistress Going to Bed, which is centered on the events leading up to a couple’s sexual union. More specifically, the speaker says, “unlace yourself, for that harmonious chime tells me from you, that now ‘tis your bed time” (10). In other words, the speaker aims to persuade his lover to join him in bed. Donne further conveys, through the speaker, that sexual union is the union of the souls, “as souls unbodied, bodies unclothed must be, to taste whole joys” (33). Though Donne too uses erotic, sexual language to describe love’s effect on an individual’s

    Read More

  • Death, Be Not Proud by John Donne

    766 Words  | 2 Pages

    In John Donne’s sonnet “Death, Be Not Proud” death is closely examined and Donne writes about his views on death and his belief that people should not live in fear of death, but embrace it. “Death, Be Not Proud” is a Shakespearean sonnet that consists of three quatrains and one concluding couplet, of which I individually analyzed each quatrain and the couplet to elucidate Donne’s arguments with death. Donne converses with death, and argues that death is not the universal destroyer of life. He elaborates on the conflict with death in each quatrain through the use of imagery, figurative language, and structure. These elements not only increase the power of Donne’s message, but also symbolize the meaning of hope of eternal life as the ultimate escape to death.

    Read More

  • Metaphysical Poetry in The Seventeenth Century

    885 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the first stanza of the poem, Donne tries to convince his lover to have sexual intercourse with him. At first one would not realize that this is his intention because he uses a flea to describe sex which is a very far-fetched description of the act hence this poem being metaphysical. Using a conceit he belittles the impact of sex and the power it has over him even though it may be untrue. Knowing that she has thought about it before, he assures her that by withholding sex from him is something so small that it does not give her power in the relationship.

    Read More

More about Donne's Use of Personification

Open Document