John Donne 'to his mistress going to bed' comparative discussion with 'Courtly love or woman as thing' and 'Unbearable Weight'

John Donne’s poems are similar in their content. They usually point out at same topics like love, lust, sex and religion; only they are dissimilar in the feelings they express. These subjects reflect the different stages of his life: the lust of his youth, the love of his married middle age, and the piety of the latter part of his life. His poem,’ The Flea’ represents the restless feeling of lust during his youthful days but it comes together with a true respect for women through the metaphysical conceit of the flea as a church in the rhythm of the sexual act.

Ever since the beginning of time, love has played an enormous role among humans. Everyone feels a need to love and to be loved. Some attempt to fill this yearning with activities and possessions that will not satisfy – with activities in which they should not participate and possessions they should not own. In Andrew Marvell’s poem, “To His Coy Mistress,” the speaker encounters an emotion some would call love but fits better under the designation of lust for a woman. In contrast, the speaker of Robert Herrick’s poem, “To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time,” urges virgins to marry, to make a lasting commitment in which love plays a

In this scenario, Empson's Donne weeps not for his lover, but for the loss of manhood that comes about from being cheated on.  It is rational reductionism, then, to say that Donne weeps for his inability to possess the woman, while still feeling possessed by her, so then he is almost put into a servile and "effeminate" position himself.  Crying, which is also considered an effeminate affair, undermines Donne's ability to be a man, so there is an undermining bitterness present when one approaches the poem with the proposed unambiguous jealousy.  Empson does not hesitate to point out that he does not believe the poem to be absolutely "sincere" in its grief.

In the final stanza, Donne’s poetic conceit is a whimsical poetic image of his feelings underlying the experience of love. A clear example of this is ‘She is all states, and all princes I;/Nothing else is;’ where Donne also uses trochaic and spondaic rhythm which emphasises the point phonetically. As in both poems, Donne’s temperament

Written during the 17th century, John Donne utilizes an unconventional genre in his poem, demeaning and objectifying the female sex. A common motif in poems of the Renaissance, Donne uses a flea as a metaphorical comparison to sexual intercourse and the eternal bind between man and woman. Illustrated throughout the poem, Donne

The theme of this poem was easily determined after reading through the poem. The poet has a certain desire of the woman he’s trying to get into his bed, making sex seem like no big deal, “How little that which thou deniest me is” (Donne); sex wasn’t taken lightly in the 17th century for unmarried woman and he attempts to make it seem as small as a flea. He is straightforward with his offer; rather than attempting to arouse the woman, he attempted to appeal to her sense of reason. Donne is in belief that she was tempted, so he attempts to coerce her into the deed. Marriage is a reoccurring theme and use of persuasion go get the woman to have sex with him, “O stay, three lives in one flea spare. Where we almost, yeah more than married are” (Donne). He uses the second stanza to focus on marriage.

Poets have written love poems for centuries with the first said to be around 1000BC. But what is love? It is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as ‘ to have attachment to and affection for’. However, after studying various love poems, I have found that love is portrayed in many different ways. It can be possessive, hateful and pure and the fact that William Shakespeare said ‘The course of true love never did run smooth’ suggests that love is more complicated than a simple dictionary definition.

Love can be quite a difficult topic to write about, expressing one’s intimate and innermost emotions requires a great level of dedication and honesty. If done correctly, the outcome is truly stunning. John Donne’s “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning” and Katherine Philips’s “To Mrs. M.A. at Parting” are two masterpieces of this genre. These poems depict the concept of true love so meticulously that the reader cannot help but envy the relationships presented. Perhaps the reason that these works are so effective is due to the fact that they are incredibly similar to each other. Although some differences are present when it comes to structure and gender concerns, the poems share the same theme of love on a spiritual level and show many parallels in meaning.

Love tends to be the topic of many poetic literary works, whether it be the joys that come with it or the pains suffered because of it, but what can be made of the love that results in both? In the poem, “For He Looked Not upon Her,” George Gascoigne already makes that message clear through his title: sometimes, there is reason not to desire what we can not help but long for. When his audience reads the work, they are meant to discover that reason behind why “He” would not look upon “Her”. Through the speaker’s form, diction, and imagery that he utilizes in the poem, it becomes clear that his tone towards love is wary, yet also conflictingly longing.

It is common to ascribe to Donne the status of archetypal logical poet- a man whose works are tightly crafted, confident, and certain in their application of metaphor and analogy. True enough, Donne’s poem seems to suggest a certain self-security: we see a tight, predictable rhyme scheme, and an ordered structure. There is also arguably a wealth of rhetorical resources - Donne does not shy away from using the lexis of the military (“triumph’st”), the medical (“two bloods…mingled”) or even the religious (“cloysterd”, “sacrilege”). Such a feature that might be read as hinting at Donne’s essential confidence in his ability to create a unified philosophy, to adapt a wide range of discourses, to

First to begin to analyze Donne’s work we must acknowledge the fact that he’s labeled as a “metaphysical poet.” The term metaphysical, in regards to his poetry, is defined in the Collins English Dictionary as “poets who combined intense feeling with ingenious thought and often used elaborate imagery and conceits.” This definition describes Donne’s poetry perfectly because he utilizes “ingenious thought” or wit in his writings but also likes to include imagery and extended metaphors to help convey the message. To further explain how Donne conveys his message and combines religion with sexuality we will discuss a few of Donne’s work including The Flea and A Valediction: forbidding Mourning.

Near the end of the poem, Donne makes an unlikely comparison between the couple and a draftsman's compass. This is one of his most famous metaphysical conceits because the two elements which are being compared appear completely different, and yet, amazingly, Donne is able to connect them. He explains that his wife is his "fixed foot" that leans towards him as he roams and straightens again as he returns, but remains his center. Her firmness is what makes his circle complete, "[a]nd makes [him] end where [he] begun"(line 36). The imagery of the circle and the spheres in this poem solidify the eternity of their love and the knowledge that the speaker will always return to the place where he began. Donne's comparisons create an image of celebration rather than mourning.

A Comparison of ‘To His Coy Mistress’ by Andrew Marvell and ‘To His Mistress Going to Bed’ by John Donne

The central theme, introduced quite early within the poem, is the helplessness of death. Throughout the poem the speaker belittles death and approaches it with such bravery and poise. Donne confronts death by saying it is not in any regard “mighty and dreadful” (2), but rather brings “much pleasure” (7). Death is personified in the poem, and in this regard, possess no greater power over man. The speaker of the poem is Donne himself. He uses his literary tools of rhetoric and poetic devices to belittle death. Throughout the poem, the speaker comes across as being slightly arrogant, but he refuses to show weakness. His arrogance shows that he is not afraid of death as he demands death not to be proud. Donne takes the association of death and sleep, and reinvents this comparison to a greater effect. He describes sleep as being “pictures” (5) of death and death is no more different or more frightening. He extends this metaphor throughout the poem. In the second last line of the poem he

John Donne John Donne had a rich life full of travel, women and religion. Donne was born in 1572 on Bread Street in London. The family was Roman Catholic which was dangerous during this time when Catholicism was being abolished and protestant was taking over. Donne’s farther was an iron monger who died in 1576. At 11 Donne and his younger brother went to university and studied there for three years then he went to Cambridge for a further three years.