Metaphysical Conceit in the Poetry of John Donne Essay

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.

    An alternate reading of "A Valediction: of Weeping" might offer a more modern approach to the poem.  In the first stanza, Donne begins with asking his lover to "Let me pour forth/My tears before thy face."  He continues by using a metaphor wherein his lover is a stamping mill, which churns out coins (his tears) which bear her face.  His lover has caused his grief and each tear he cries is marked by her influence, but at the same time they are coins, which carry a value to them beyond their own intrinsic values.  Donne also says of the coins: "For thus they be/Pregnant of thee."  This is a fascinating description of his tears, because Donne reverses gender roles in order to describe something which is emanating from him as "pregnant."

Lastly, he compares his heart to a piece of glass (mirror) by saying “those pieces still, through they be not unite; and now as broken glasses show a hundred lesser faces, so my rags of heart can like, wish, and adore, but after one such love, can love no more.'; In this quote Donne show us that his heart has been shattered into a thousand pieces and that they are still in the place where his heart should be. Donne can never repair his broken heart; therefore, he will live in pain until he dies. In the last line of this quote, Donne says that once you have loved someone that deeply you can never feel love like that again.

In your answer you should consider the ways in which Donne and Jennings use form, structure and language to present their thoughts and ideas. You should make relevant references to your wider reading in the poetry of love (40 marks).

Donne transformed the love poetry he wrote in his early days, beginning in 1617 with the death of his wife Anne More, to religious poetry with a strong sense of awareness of death and its import. This poetic development from classical poetry to more personal poetry reflects the events that marked his own life, and can be traced throughout his poetry. This kind of personal and thereby

John Donne and his “songs and sonnets” were 19 different poems and songs. The one that stuck out and was enjoyable to me was “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning”. Donne wrote about a man that had to go away. During the time it was written, Donne was supposed to be going to the Continent but there is no proof of it. It is said that the poem is written for Donne’s wife. It brings out the Romanticism of that time and also the pain that comes with it. He finds a common marker between the two and describes how nothing will be able to break them apart.

The first imagery represents the discourse of bible in the way here God is a workman, the creator repairing his creation. However, this ‘repair’ evokes the free will of Donne as he associates God with violence through words like ‘break, blow, burn’, ‘o’erthrow […] bend to and make […] new.’ These verbs seem to connote impatient physical movements thus revealing the agitation and spiritual conflict of Donne. ‘This is as apparent as much in vehement, bludgeoning rhythms as in the way syntax and subject matter are fractured.’14 The ‘b’ alliteration highlights these ‘hives of energy.’15 The second imagery where he views himself as a town being seized with force by God does not dilute the violence. The free will of Donne lies in the paradox that while formally every Christian would feel fulfilled if God reigns their lives, Donne sees this as a usurpation and even tries to ‘defend.’ Instead of feeling blessed, he feels ‘captiv’d’ and ‘weak. This may be unveiling how maybe he does not evince free will but feels chained to religion. This may be the reason why there is no sense of piety between Donne and God but sense of imprisonment. The third imagery reflects ambiguity and free will. The enemy seems to be the Protestant church and he asks God to ‘divorce, untie’ which trapped him. The irony is stark when Donne asks God to ‘imprison’ him while everyone seeks liberation. ‘Break that knot’ may

In poetry, poets can shape every component (words, syntax, rhythm, punctuation, etc.) to convey a unique meaning. Small changes in such elements can have drastic effects on what the reader will draw from the poem. Often, poets will rely on some tools more than others to try and convey their meaning. Many times, the period in which the poet is writing will strongly influence how the poet uses these elements. John Donne and Gertrude Stein are considered shapers of metaphysical poetry and modern poetry respectively, and the way they manipulate their poetry reflects the ideas of their literary periods. Gertrude Stein, as a cubist poet, plays with diction, syntax, and punctuation to impart meaning. Meanwhile, John Donne, as a metaphysical poet, relies more on the use of imagery and conceits to illustrate the purpose of his poems.

Donne first set books named Satires, songs and sonnets in 1590 s. Donne married lady Eger ton’s niece Ann More. Most of his successors called Metaphysical poet by Samuel Johnson in 187. He is considered a master of conceits. Donne died in

Where Donne in his poem, try to celebrate death for his said lack of power on life, providing a 360 degree change of what most of the common people think of death. This poem can also be perceived as act of ego from the poet which may be interpreted as Donne considering himself superior to what it is believed Adam from the bible brings by his disobedience from God i.e. death. The poem ends in a paradox “And death shall be more; Death, thou shalt die”. It seems like the speaker is addressing a funeral oration to death, which is quite absurd as who can kill death? But we can associate this belief to the sayings in the Bible about God being supreme “The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death” (Corinthians 1).

When John Donne’s collection of poetry, Songs and Sonnets, was published in 1633 it was established as a piece of literature that would transcend the ages, containing wit, experimentation and creativity. However, once the years furthered into the late nineteenth century and the audience of Donne’s work grew outside of the usual collective of male readers, a new perspective took shape. These ideas did not dismiss the change Donne’s work brought to his genre but rather questioned the attitude towards his genders counterpart within the poetry. A feministic approach emerged with the acknowledgement that Donne’s views revealed sexist when analyzed. Such concepts are discussed within George Parfitt’s John Donne as the novel considers Donne’s opinions along with it’s relation to his history. This wave of feministic criticism is exhibited when Parfitt examines the belief that John’s work narrows women into a set group and observes that “as a category women are objects of Donne’s wit and of interest only in that respect.” (32). During the poet’s life he became a part of the courts where Donne preached during his time as a priest in 1615 until his death. This setting allowed for little connection with women outside his wife and other lower class women as it was an all male institution, thus his understanding of the female mind exterior from these instances did not hold validity. Parfitt comments that “the excluded sex [was] both idealised and denigrated,” (30) in said environments.

In John Donne's "A Valediction: for Weeping," the speaker consoles his lover before leaving on a sea voyage and begs her not to cry.  Crying, the speaker tells his lover this poem at the docks before he boards his ship going abroad.  Donne uses a spherical image as the central metaphor in his poem. When Donne uses irony, paradox, and hyperbole including the use of round images such as: coins, globes, and tears he strengthens the spherical conceit.  By comparing two "seeming" opposites like tears and love as his conceit, Donne uses the spherical image as the central paradox in "A Valediction: Of Weeping."

The metaphysical poets were segregated in the seventeenth century to form a new and distinct style of poetry that employed immaculate wit, complex metaphors and luminous imagery. John Donne’s poetry is no exception to the form and thematic volume of the metaphysicals. Donne explores ideas in a manner which some readers find confronting and enlightening through relentless use of metaphysical conceits and his direct address to an individual or god. Donne confronts and enlightens seventeenth century readers with his elaborate perspective on love and his perception of death. Although these are two dissimilar subjects, they are interwoven in many of Donne’s poems which includes, ‘A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning,’

This is a long and difficult process, however, and those who succeed in it act as if they have awakened from a dream and finally discovered the true destiny of their soul. Overwhelmed with joy, they do not wish to return to the cave, but Plato insists that they must, to educate and free their fellow human beings who are still inside. In the first stanza of "The Good Morrow," Donne and his lady are in darkness, but in the second, they have emerged into the sunlight, awakened from the dream that they previously considered to be reality, and discovered perfection. The perfection they have found, however, is not God but each other, and they feel no responsibility toward those human beings who are still in darkness. As in Plato, it is perfection rather than size that is of the highest importance, and the little room the lovers dwell in becomes more significant than all the vast new worlds discovered by seventeenth-century voyagers and students of the heavens.

The two main views of metaphysical poetry, as composed by poets A.E. Housman and T.S. Eliot, are vastly different. Eliot’s view of metaphysical poetry is a very positive and respectful one. He admires the uniqueness of the metaphysical poets when he describes them as “reflective poets” as opposed to merely intellectual ones. Eliot says they have the ability to “feel their thought as immediately as the odor of a rose,” compared to the strictly thought-driven traditional poetry of lyrical poets. Housman’s view is significantly more harsh and critical. In reference to metaphysical poetry, he says that “poetry, as a label for this particular commodity, is not appropriate.” According to Housman,