John Donne Italian Sonnet

Powerless Death
In John Donne’s Italian sonnet, “Death be not proud,” deaths lack of power over humanities continuation of life is exposed through personification, tone, and metaphor. This Petrarchan sonnet, “sonetto” in Italian meaning “little song,” is presented in the standard fourteen line, two stanza “rime” scheme (Kennedy, Gioia, 2016, pp. 610-611). In the “first eight lines,” known as the octave, a standard “a b b a a b b a” pattern is utilized (Kennedy, Gioia, 2016, p. 611). Following the octave, is the second stanza, the sestet, in which an artist has the freedom to choose a “rime” pattern or “almost any other variation that doesn’t end in a couplet” to create their masterpiece (Kennedy, Gioia, 2016, p. 611). In the case of “Death

Consider when the speaker states, “rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,” this metaphorical phrase is suggesting that rest and sleep are both pictorial images of death (Donne, 1610). Further on, when the orator expresses that “poppy, or charm can make us sleep as well,” he has implied that sleep and death are both the same, they are equals, as both are but a temporary state of being (Donne, 1610). Again, this same insinuation is made as he says that “one short sleep past, we wake eternally,” suggesting once more that death is equivalent to a momentary passing of sleep (Donne,

It is evident that while Death assumes itself powerful, being “swell’st” with pride, it hath no power, visible as he states “nor yet canst thou kill me,” to cause life to cease its existence (Donne, 1610). Death is but a mere “slave,” whose ability is simply to cause one to have a “short sleep,” while awaiting entry into an eternal life (Donne, 1610). The best moment of all, is Death’s last warning, as it is told that it shall be the one to cease to go on, as with eternity “death shall be no more, death, thou shalt die” (Donne,