SECULAR AS WELL AS DIVINE REFLECTIONS IN JOHN DONNE’S POETRY

IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 SECULAR AS WELL AS DIVINE REFLECTIONS IN JOHN DONNE’S POETRY Dr Pratibha Mallikarjun Guest Lecturer Government First Grade College, Farhatabad, Kalaburagi J ohn Donne t he founde r of t he so cal l ed 'M et aph ysi c al ' school of poetry. He is the greatest of the poets of this school. Some other important poets who belong to the band of this group are George Herbert, Thomas Carew, Richard Crawshaw, Henry Vaugham, Andrew Marvell, Abraham Cowley and so on. Of all these Metaphysical poets, John Donne is the greatest and well known. B y the end , of the 16 t h and the beginning of the 17t h century, the great Elizabethan poetry had exhausted itself. Signs of decadence were visible everywhere. There were three traditions that were generally followed. They are: The Spenserian, The Arcadian and the Petr archan. Every thing was conventional and artificial during this age. There was little that was original or remarkable. There was much s u g a r e d m e l o d y a n d r o m a n t i c e x t r a v a g a n c e , b u t i t w a s f u l l o f intellectual emptiness. In the first decade of the 17 th . Century there was revolt against the out- dated and exhausted Elizabethan poetry. As C. S. Le w i s e x p r e s s e d , “ M e t a p h ys i c i s m i n p o e t r y i s t h e f r u i t o f t h e Renaissance tree becoming over-ripe and approaching putrescence”. J o h n D o n n e d i d n o t l i k e t h a t s u g a r c o a t e d m e l o d y, r o m a n t i c extravagance and intellectual emptiness. He revolted against it. In fact, a group of poets came forward to revolt against this conventional and traditional way of writing poetry. The leaders of this revolt were Ben Johnson and John Donne. Both of them were powerful personalities. They attracted staunch followers and wonderful schools. The first, Ben Johnson, the founder of the classical school which reached its full flowering in the poetry of Dryden and Pope — was primarily a dramatist. As a poet he, profoundly influenced the Caroline Lyricists. The other is John Donne. His poetry is remarkable for its concentrated passion, intellectual agility and dramatic power. He is given to introspection and self analysis. He writes of no imaginary shep herds and shepherdesses but of his own intellectual, spiritual and amorous experiences . His early Satyrs, his S o n g s a n d S o n n e t s , h i s H o l y S o n n e t s a n d s o o n a r e d i f f e r e n t expressions of his varied experiences. His poetry is marked with realism, but it is always forceful and startling. He is the founder of the so called “Metaphysical School” of poetry, of which Richard Crashaw, George Herbert, Henry Vaugham and Abraham Cowley are the other leading poets. Literall y ‘Meta’ means be yond and ‘Ph ysics ’ means physical n a t u r e . It was Dryden who first used the word, “Metaph ysical” in c o n n e c t i o n International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 209 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 w i t h D o n n e ’ s p o e t r y a n d w r o t e , “ D o n n e a f f e c t s t h e metaphysics” and Dr. Johnson confirmed the judgement of Dryden, e v e r s i n c e t h e w o r d , M e t a p h ys i c a l h a s b e e n u s e d f o r D o n n e a n d h i s f o l l o w e r s . H o w e v e r , the t e r m i s a n u n f o r t u n a t e o n e , f o r i t i m p l i e s a process of dry reasoning, a speculation about the nature of the universe, the problem of life and death. Milton’s Paradise Lost, Pope's Essay on Man , and even Tennyson's ‘In Memoriam’ may be called metaphysical poems for they are concerned with the nature of things. Donne's poetry is not metaphysical in the true sense of the word. A metaphysical poem is long, while Donne’s poems are short. His poetry doesn’t expound any philosophical system of the universe, rather it is as much concerned with his emotions and personal experiences, as any other poetry. No doubt, there is m uch : intellectual anal ysis of ‘emotion’ and “ experience”, but this by itself can't be called metaphysical. The poetry of the school of Donne is not metaphysical as far as its content is concerned. Grierson views that “Donne is metaphysical not only by virtue of his scholasticism, but by his deep reflective interest in the e x p e r i e n c e s o f w h i c h h i s p o e t r y i s t h e e x p r e s s i o n , t h e n e w psychological curiosity with which he writes of love and religion”.2 In other words, Donne’s poetry may be called, ‘Metaphysical’ only in as far as its technique or style is concerned. It is heavily overloaded with conceits which may be defined as the excessive use of over-elaborated similes and metaphors, drawn from the most far fetched, remote and unfamiliar sources. Dr. Johnson defines a conceit as the perception of, ‘occult resemblances in things apparently unlike! Poets have always perceived similarity between dissimilar objects and u s e d s i m i l e s a n d m e t a p h o r s t o c o n v e y t h e i r p e r c e p t i o n o f t h a t similarity. Similarly, Donne and the other metaphysical poets use words which call the mind into play, rather than those which speak to the senses or, evoke an emotional response through memory. They use words which have no associative value. This intellectual bias affects the forms of their poems and their rhythm . In their conceits, they constantly bring together the abstract and the concrete, the remote and the near, the spiritual and the material, the finite and the infinite, the sublime and the common place. Thus Donne draws his imagery from such varied sources as medieval theology, Scholastic philosophy, the P t o l e m i c a s t r o n o m y o f t h e M i d d l e A g e s , a n d t h e c o n c e p t s o f contemporary science. His mind moves with great agility from one such concept to another, and it requires an equal agility on the part of the readers to follow him. Hence the difficult nature of his poetry, and hence the charge of obscurity that has been brought against him. Widely divergent elements are, ‘yoked by violence together’. International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 210 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 The chief characteristics of Donne's poetry may be summed up as follows: 1) It is complex and difficult. Most varied concepts are brought together. 2) It is intellectual in tone. There is an analysis of the most delicate shades of psychological experiences. 3) There is a fusion of emotion and intellect, a there is intellectual analysis of emotions personally experience by the poet. 4) It is full of conceits which are learned, intellectual and ove relaborated. 5) It is argumentative. There is subtle evolution of thought as Donne advances arguments after arguments to prove his point. He is often like a lawyer choosing the fittest arguments for the case. 6) Originality is achieved by the use of a new vocabulary drawn from the world of trade and commerce, the art and the sciences. 7) In order to arrest attention often a poem begins abruptly and c o l l o q u i a l l y, a n d t h e u n u s u a l r h yt h m s a r e u s e d . U n u s u a l compound words are also used for the same purpose. 8) It is often dramatic in form. The Blossome is the form of a di al ogu e bet w een t he poet an d hi s heart whi ch i s t reat ed as a separate entity. As has been well said his poetry presents a ‘drama of ideas’. In a sense, his lyrics are dramatic. A poem of Donne is a piece of drama. The Canonization is one of the best known poems of Donne. Coleridge admired the poem, and it was one of his favourite readings. It is a love- poem having all metaphysical elements. It expresses Donne's positive attitude towards love, an attitude of satisfaction and absorption in a love relationship. Critics have taken it to be an expression of the poets love for Anne Moore, whom he loved passionately and devotedly, and elopement and subsequent marriage with whom ruined his fortunes. But nothing can be asserted with any certainty in this respect The poem is based on a paradox. A paradox is a selfcontradictory statement. It’s very title ‘Canonization’ is paradoxical. As Cleanth Books points out a clever paradox underlies the poem, for the poet daringly treats profane love as if it were divine love. Love of women is a profane activity denounced by t he Church. The lovers have no t renounced the world and the pleasures of the flesh. They indulge in the joys of love-making. Still they are called “saints”. But the poet cleverly argues his case, and succeeds in establishing that devoted lovers, like the poet and his beloved, are saints, though they are saints of love International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 211 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 They have renounced the world for each other. They are devoted to each other as a saint is to God and therefore they may be rightly called saints of love. They have renounced the world for each other, and the body of the each is an hermitage for the other 1. Love Donne’s Songs and Sonnets do not describe a single unchanging view of love; they express a wide variety of emotions and attitudes, as if Donne himself were trying to define his experience of love through his poetry. Love can be a religious experience, or merely a sexual one, and it can give rise to emotions ranging from ecstasy to despair. Taking any one poem in isolation will give us a limited view of Donne’s attitude to love, but t reat ing each poem as part of a t ot alit y of experi ence, represented by all the Songs and Sonnets, it gives us an insight into the complex range of experiences that can be grouped under the single headed ‘Love’. In ‘To his Mistris Going to Bed’, we see how highly Donne can praise erotic pleasure. He addresses the woman as: 0, my America, my New found land, My kingdom, safest when with one man mann'd, My mine of precious stones, my empery;3 The images are of physical, material wealth, and anyone reading this poem alone would think Donne's interest in women was limited to the sexual level. He describes in terms of a religious experience; the woman is as ‘Angel’, she provides ‘A. heaven like Mahomet ’s paradise’, and the bed is ‘loves hallow’d temple’. But although erotic, this is not a love poem; nowhere does he say that he loves the woman, or that sex is part of a deeper relationship. In t h e ‘ E x t a s i e ’ D o n n e c o n v e ys a v e r y d i f f e r e n t a n d more ' complex attitude to erotic pleasure, when it is just one part of the experience of love This Extasie doth unperplex (We said) and tell us what We love, Wee see by this, it was not sexe,. Wee see, we saw not what did move... Loves mysteries in soules doe grow, But yet the body is his booke.4 International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 212 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 The body and the soul are distinct, but related aspects of the totality of love. The uniting of souls is the purest and highest form of love, but this can only be attained through the uniting of bodies. This focus on the soul leads Donne to express a con descending attitude towards physical love in this poem which is in marked contrast to the attitude he expressed in ‘To his Mistris Going to Bed’. But in reading Donne one soon learns that an attitude expressed in one poem is not to be taken as absolute and excl usive. One of Donne's characteristics is that he feely contradicts himself from one poem to another. The title . of this poem, he Extasie implies that love is a religious experience, Just as the diction of ‘To his Mistris Going to Bed? conveyed sex as a religious experience. The religious metaphors give a hyperbolic intensity to his imagery, but the ideas expressed in the Extasie are firmly rooted in the scientific theories of his day Donne's view that spiritual love can be attained through physical love ties in with the contemporary theory of the chain of being' [2]. A n g e l s p r e s u m a b l y, c o u l d e x p e r i e n c e a t o t a l l y s p i r i t u a l l o v e , unadulterated by the physical. But man, being part divine and part animal, can only reach the spiritual level through the sensual. The inherent superiority of the spiritual level, and the part love can play in refining man’s nature towards the spiritual, is expressed in these lines: If any, so by love refin’d, That he soules language understood, And by good love were growen all minde.5 The scientific framework of Donne’s view of love is also seen here: But as all sever all soules containe Mixture of things, they know not what, Love, these mixt soules, doth mix againe, And makes both one, each this and that.6 Just as the four elements, earth, air, fire and water were supposed to combine to form new substances, so two souls mix to form a new unity. The strength and durability of this new unit is dependent upon how well the elements of the two souls are balanced, as we see from these lines from ‘the Good-Morrow’: Whatever dies, was not mix’d equally; If our two loves be one, or thou and I Love so alike that none can slacken, none can die.7 International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 213 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 A good exam pl e of t hi s st at e, where two lov ers ’ souls con not be separat ed, even when the y are physi call y far apart, is s een in ‘A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning’. If they be two, they are two so As stiffe twin compasses are two, Thy soule the fixt foot, makes no show To move, but doth, if the othern doe.8 The idea of two coming together to form one is very important in Donne's view of love. When a couple find perfect love together they become allsufficient to one another, forming a world of their own , which has no need of the out side world. This idea is expressed in these lines from ‘The Sunne Rising’. She’is all States, and all Princes, 1, Nothing else is. Princes doe but play us; compar’d tothis, All honor’s mimique; All wealth alchimie. Thou sunne art halfe as happy'as wee, In that the world’s contracted thus; Thine age askes ease, and since thy duties bee To warme the world, that’s done in warming us. Shine here to us, and thou art every where.9 For Donne love transcends all worldl y val ues. As we see in ‘The Canonization’, values such as wealth and glory have no place in the world of love. With wealth your state, your mind with arts improve; Take you a course, get you a place, Observe his Honour, or his Grace; Or the king’s real, or his stamp’d face Contemplate ; what you will, approve, So you will let me love.10 Like love itself, the women to whom Donne’s verses are addressed are usually praised in hyperbolic terms. In ‘The Sunne Rising’ her eyes shine brighter than the Sun. And in ‘The Dreame’ she is praised as a being above the level of angels. Yet I thought thee (For thou lovest truth) an Angell, at first sight, But when I saw thou sawest my heart, And knew'st my thoughts, beyond an Angels art, International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 214 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 When thou knew'st what I dreamt, when thou knew'st when Excesse of joy would wake me, and cam'st then, I must confesse, it could not chuse but bee. Prophane, to thinke thee any thing but thee.11 This reverence for woman sometimes leads Donne close to adopting the traditional attitude of the courtly lover [3], who suffers through being in love with a woman, usually already married, who scorns him. An example of this kind of love is suggested by the references to the symptoms of love in ‘The Canonization’. Alas, alas, who’s injur’d by my love? What merchants ships have my sighs drown'd? Who saies my teares have overflow'd his ground? When did my Colds a forward2 spring remove? When did the heats which my veines fill Add one more to the plaguie Bill? 12 The courtly love ideal, however, is in conflict with Donne's ideal of two well -matched and well-balanced lovers, whose souls unite to form one. In the poem ‘Loves Deitie’, he expresses his contempt for the courtly ideal, which he sees as a corruption of the true nature of love. I cannot thinke that hee, who then lov'd most, Sunke so low, as to love one which did scorne. … ……….. ....................... It cannot bee Love, till I love her, that loves mee.13 In fact, Donne is unusual, if not unique, for his era is that courtly love hardly appears in his poetry at all. Courtly love seems to depend on the lover being unsuccessful, where as Donne rejoices in success at every level. And the courtly love poet always expresses the same experience of Love, the range of situations and emotions dealt with being very limited. In contrast Donne expresses and enormously wide range of feelings in his Songs and Sonnets, all relating to the experience of love, but varying from the heights of ecstasy to the depths of despair. This variety of feeling leads Donne's poetry much of its impact, for we seem to be reading an individual's personal experience of love, and not just a poet's contribution to a long standing tradition of poetic love. We see in his poetry how in ‘The Extasie’ Donne describes love as a sublime union of two souls. This, perhaps is the highest form of l o v e , b u t b y n o m e a n s t h e o n l y o n e . ‘ T h e D r e a m e ’ e x p r e s s e s a passionate mood of a more down -to -earth nature. International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 215 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 “Enter these armes, for since thou thoughtst it best, Not to dreame all my dreame, let’s act the rest.” The Sunne Rising expresses the reckless pride and satisfaction felt by the lover in bed with his mistress. “BUSIE old foole, unruly Sunne, Why dost thou thus, Through windowes, and through curtaines call on us?”15 In ‘The Flea’ Donne adopts a cynical and rather flippant tone towards his woman, using his wit to try to belittle and overcome her moral arguments, in favour of immediate pleasure “Marke but this flea, and marke in this, How little that which thou deny'st rue is;”16 For Donne, love can lead to suffering and disillusionment as well as to ecstasy. ‘A Nocturnal upon S. Lucie’s day’, being the shortest day is an extremely powerful evocation of the suffering, caused by the death of a loved one, an experience which takes him beyond suffering to a state of absolute nothingness. In ‘Twicknam Garden’ Done expresses extremes of disillusionment, his view of love here being totally opposed to his view in ‘The Extasie’. The spider love, transubstantiate all, And can convert Manna to gall, And that this place may thoroughly be thought 17 True Paradise, I have the serpent brought” And his view of woman is totally opposed to the view expressed in most of his love poems. Nor can you more judge womans thoughts by teares, Then by her shadow, what she weares. O perverse sexe, where none is true but shee, Who's therefore true, because her truth kills mee.18 Finally we ought to consider whether Donne's poetry expresses real love at all, or whether, as some criti cs suggest, h e was merel y a talented poet using his wit and ingenuit y to creat e clever poems. Johnson said of the metaphysical poets: ‘Their courtship was void of fondness and their lamentation of sorrow’. He did not feel that Donne's poetry moved the affections, or that Donne had necessarily felt the emotions in order to write the poems International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 216 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 Donne's poems are extraordinarily witty and ingenious, but this does not exclude the possibility that they also contain strong emotion. Donne's poems are quite capable of stirring the emotions , and no matter how clever his conceits, or revolutionary his thought, his poems would not work without a seed of genuine feeling at their centre. Then by her shadow, what she weares. “O perverse sexe, where none is true but shee, Who's therefore true, because her truth kills mee”.19 Finally we ought to consider whether Donne's poetry expresses real love at all, or whether, as some criti cs suggest, he was merel y a talented poet using his wit and ingenuit y to create clever p oems. Johnson said of the metaphysical poets: ‘Their courtship was void of fo nd n e ss an d t h ei r l am ent at i on of sor r ow ’. H e d i d n ot f ee l t h at Donne’s poetry moved the affections, or that Donne had necessarily felt the emotions in order to write the poems Donne’s poems are extraordinarily witty and ingenious, but this does not exclude the possibility that they also contain strong emotion. Donne's poems are quite capable of stirring the emotions, and no matter how clever his conceits, or revolutionary his thought, his poems would not work without a seed of genuine feeling at their centre We will notice that we will read poems with two very different sets of subject matter. The first set will be love poems — everything f r o m t h e h u m o r o u s ‘ C a r p e d i e m ’ a r gu m e n t of ‘The Flea’ to the profoundly philosophical ‘The Ecstasy’. The second set of poems, and the prose meditations are examples of Donne’s religious poetry. We will notice that both sets of poems use complex imagery and surprising comparisons; they are what we have come to call metaphysical poetry. That Donne’s poetry covers two such different subjects should not be surprising, given his lively and interesting biography. John Donne was born in 1572 i nto a Roman Catholic family, which placed him at quite a disadvantage during the Elizabethan era. Though he attended both Oxford and Cambridge universities he was not able to graduate, since all graduates had to take an oath of allegiance to the Crown, which accepted the supremacy of the English ruler over the Church. He went on to study law, but he eventually returned to the study of theology, at least in part to resolve his own mind about the tension between the Catholic and Anglican doctrines. He traveled to Spain in the late 1590s, and he spent some of his International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 217 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 time writing lyric love poems, which were circulated in manuscripts but generally not printed unt i l a f t e r hi s de at h ( w e wi l l r e ad sev e r al o f t h es e ). He b e ca m e secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton and seemed to be on his way to a solid career But in 1601, 28 year old John Donne made a rash move. He ran away with 17 year old Anne More who was his employer’s niece and the ' daughter of a powerful man who vehemently disapproved of the marriage. Donne lost his job and was temporarily put in prison. This famous quip about this situation — “John Donne, Anne Donne, undone” — all too accurately described his financial plight. Despite their money woes, their marriage was by all accounts, a very happy one (see “A Valediction forbidding mourning”) B y 1607, Donne had resol ved hi s reli gi ous m isgi vi ngs and became a member of the Church of England, though he refused at this point to become an Anglican priest. He wrote a trac t urging other English Catholics to take the oath of allegiance to the king, and he be c am e a f a vo ur i t e o f K i n g J am e s I ( wh o ha d hi s o wn C at hol i c leanings). He finally was ordained in 1615 and was named chaplain to the king In 1617, Anne Donne died at age 32, in the process of giving birth to their 12 child. Despite being left to raise all of those children on his own ( seven had survived infancy), Donne never remarried. Izaak Watton, writing in 1675, said that Donne's “abundant affection which once was betwixt him and who had long been the delight of his eyes and the companion of his youth... not hard to think but that she being now removed by death, a commeasurable grief took as full a possession of him as joy had done; and so indeed it did. For now his very soul was element of nothing but sadness...” th Donne dedicated himself to his religious work. In 1621 he was named Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral. He-was recognized as one of the g r e a t preachers of the era... and this was in an era when great preaching was everywhere. We will read one of the meditations that is part of Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions . Donne died in 1631 The first published coll ection of hi s poetr y appeared two years aft er his death. The poetry of John Donne and the other metaphysical poets. was rediscovered at the beginning of the 20th Century, when it had profound influence on the lyric poetry of the early 20th Century, specifically that of T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, W. H. Auden, Dylan, Thomas and others. According to the introduction in one anthology, “The dramatic and c o l l o q u i a l q u a l i t i e s o f D o n n e ’ s w o r k , International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com 83 Page 218 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 together with his acute psychological after by the modern idiom — make it easy contemporary, as a strangely modern figure...” online ISSN 2277 – 9809 insights — all elements sought to regard the poet as our own But Donne's poems were not so well received in the 18 th Century, when they were dismissed as overly complex and indecorous in language. According to the 18 th Century poet John Dryden, for instance, Donne was guilt y of “perplex [ing] the minds of the fair sex with nice speculations of philosophy when he should engage their hearts, and entertain them with the softness of love”. Samuel Johnson also found t h e m e t a p h ys i c a l s e n s i b i l i t y t o b e a b i t e x c e s s i v e , s a yi n g t h a t metaphysical religious poetry attempted to reflect “in a concave mirror the sidereal hemisphere” But modern readers admire the combination o f p a s s i o n a n d i n t e l l e c t , w h a t E l i o t c a l l e d D o n n e ' s “ u n i f i e d sensibility”. “A Valediction Forbidding Mourning ’ is one of his favourite poems. What does “valediction” mean? Donne wrote this poem in 1611 as he was leaving home to go visit his mother. This poem is to his wife to cheer her up. We should not mourn because if love is more than physical, relationships continue because the soul still lives. Those who have only senses of the body cannot stand separation because the senses depend on the object of affection being present. Their relationship it stretched thin but not breached or broken. It's expanded. He is leaving to go on a trip, but promises he will return. He compares their souls to compasses. This is the image of the compass you would use in geometry, which was another popular image at the time. The points may be far apart, but they are connected in the center. The further apart the points are, the more the compass legs lean toward each other. She stays put-while he traces the path around, and as long as she remains firm, he'll return to the same spot he started from. Nineteen of Donne's poems have been grouped together as the Divine Meditations. Instead of the usual subject of the speaker's love and lust for some beloved individual, this sequence focuses on Donne's religious experience, his relationship to God. “Death be not proud” — death should not be feared; you can not be killed because death is like sleeping. We are really at rest when we die Death is controlled by fate, chance, kings, etc., which all cause death. Death keeps company with unsavory things like poison, war, etc. There are two passages from the Bible that Donne could well have in mind as he wrote these lines. International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 219 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; for the former things are passed away. (I Corinthians 15: 54-57). So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin ; and strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. He prays to God to free him from sin forcibly — beat the evil (devil?) out of him. He needs a rou gh grace to overcome his sinful nature. Reason should govern him, but it is fallible and has been enslaved by his passion ( remember this theme from the Wife of Bath ) He's "Betrothed" to sin - under its power. He uses axymorons to bring home his point. ‘He’ll only free if God enslaves him. He’ll only be chaste (pure) if God ravishes (rapes) him. T h e i m a ge s h e r e a r e very strong & sometimes hard to take. The m e t a p h ys i c a l poets liked such “Strong lines”, sing shocking comparisons to jolt the readers. Donne or Herbert — religious, ordained minister. They show a puritan influence: plain English terms’. John Donne went to prison because he married his boss’s niece who as a minor. Drifted around afterwards. Supported writing throughpatronage. Greates metaphysical poet. Used by mystical writers as the technical name for the state of rapture in which the body was supposed to become incapable of sensation, while the soul was engaged in the contemplation of divine things. Now onl y Hist or allusive. To be beside oneself - Donne literalizes this by having the Souls leave the body. Only the person refined by love could understand the language they speak to each other in those silent moments Sex involves motion, so what they have is something else, an unmoving emotion. That which moves is generally inferior to that which doesn't. God is sometimes called “The unmoved mover”, making him superior to everything. Trying to decide what to do - is love or not- lasts all day. John Donne (1572 — 1631) wrote many Petrarchan love poems, poems in which the lover is unrequited and frustrated, though he rarely used t he International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 220 • • IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 S onnet form t o do so; i n most of hi s poems wit h P et rarchan s p e a k e r s , h e r e w o r k s t h e t r a d i t i o n t h r o u g h p l a yf u l o r s e r i o u s innovations. Donne also wrote distinctly anti-Petrarchan and anti- Platonic poetry, much of which is Ovidian in Character. with these facts in mind, we consider the following three works: This is a poem clearly influenced by the Ovidian approach to love. Be prepared to discuss how the wit of the poem operates. Discussion leaders on this work: Calandra, Jo, Dave. This poem is a variation on another important poetic genre dating back to classical literature, one that we will see again later in the course; the “Carpe Diem” poem. The Latin phrase means “Seize the Day”, and the poem is usually addressed to a young woman, attempting to seduce her b y urging her to enjo y life and love whil e she is still young and beautiful. In Donne's poem; however, the woman is not the addressee; and that’s the twist. SUMMATION Very few know that John Donne had a valid social and spiritual philosophy. As one who had looked before and after, within and without, in him, the spi ritualit y has come of age a n d found a new dimension. The s u b j e c t o f h i s p o e t r y i s complex as well as important. It is relevant to the present day social fabric. A n y o n e w h o i s a c q u a i n t e d w i t h J o h n D o n n e ' s p o e t r y realizes that he was ‘of the first order of poets’. He is perhaps the most singular of English poets. His verses offer examples ever ything casti gat ed b y classi cal Writers as bad t ast e and eccentricity. It i s a l s o o b s e r v e d t h a t D o n n e a s a p o e t i s c e r t a i n l y d i f f i c u l t o f access. As a poetic artistic, Donne is highly original, unique and revolutionary. As far as his diction and v e r s i f i c a t i o n a r e c o n c e r n e d , h e t a k e s h i s r a n k w i t h s u c h reformers of the English tongue as WordsWorth and T.S. Eliot. Donne identifies himself with his intellectual analogy and with his emotion. A note on philosophy of Love and his treatment of Love i s clearly discussed which is the hallmark of his ‘Vivid R eal i sm ’. His t r e a t m e n t o f L o v e i s b o t h s e n s u o u s a n d realistic. He does not completel y reject the pleasures of the b o d y e v e n i n p o e m s w h e r e l o v e i s t r e a t e d a s t h e h i g h e s t spiritual passion. This em phasis on the claims of the body is another feature which distinguishes Donne from the poets both of the P et rarchan an d P l at oni c schools . Love, m erel y of t he b o d y, i s n o t Lo v e b u t Lu s t . B u t h e i s r e a l i s t i c e n o u g h t o realise that it can’t also be of the soul International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 221 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 alone. It must partake both of the soul and the body. If is the body which brings the souls together and so 'the claims of the body must not be ignored. Donne lets us know Very little about the beauty of the woman he loves. He writes exclusively about the emotion of love and not about its cause. He describes and anal yses the experience of being in love and charm of his mistress are either not mentioned at all or can only be suggested from the stray hints that he happens to drop. It was also noticed that Donne has often called a cynic in his attitude towards love and woman. There is no doubt that h i s a t t i t u d e t o w a r d s w o m a n i n h i s e a r l y p o e m s i s o n e o f contempt. Donne at the same time did not accept the view that Marriage alone sacrifices the sexual act, nor the medieval view that sex is alike sinful within or without the marriage bond. Obviously, a radical Change of this kind will not begin on a man or a large scale. More likely, it will begin with the individual, always the pioneer. This increases the res p o n s i b i l i t y o f a l l o f u s , t h e f i r s t n e e d w o u l d b e o f individuals who have seen or felt in themselves this coming truth or change the pattern of living and who have tried, in their own way, to live it out. But isolated individuals - well intentioned - can not be the answer - sooner or later, there will surely be groups, voluntarily formed, of like minded people. A spiritual society will live, like the individuals that compare it not in the ego but in the spirit, not as the collective ego but as the collective soul. <><>00000<><> BIBLIOGRAPHY PRIMARY & SECONDARY SOURCES: John of the Cross. Spiritual Canticle. 3rd revised ed. Garden City, NY: Image Books; 1961· Martz, Louis.“Donne and Herbert: Vehement Grief and Silent Tears.” John Donne Journal 7(1988):21-34. Gardner, Helen, ed. The Divine Poems. By John Donne. Oxford: Clarendon; 1964. Herbert, George. The Works of George Herbert. Ed. F.E. Hutchinson. Oxford: Clarendon; 1964. Hilton, Walter. The Scale of Perfection. Trans. Evelyn Underhill. London: John M. Watkins; 1923. Hopkins, Jasper. A Concise Introduction to the Philosophy of Nickolas of .Cusa. 2nd ed. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P; 1980. · Husain, Itrat. The dogmatlc and Mystical Theology of John Donne. London:Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge;NewYork: International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 222 IRJMSH YEAR [2012] Volume 3 Issue 3 online ISSN 2277 – 9809 Macmillan; 1938. Jolm of the Cross. Spiritual Canticle. 3rd revised ed. Garden City, NY: Image Books; 1961. Levao, Ronald. Renaissance Minds and Their Fictions; Cusanus, Sidney, Shakespeare. Berkeley:U of California P; 1985. Linville, Susan E. “Contrary Faith :Poetic Closure and the Devotional Lyric.” Papers on Language and Literature 20(1984): 141-53 Donne, John. Letters to severall persons of Honour (1651) Delmar, NYL Scholars’+- Facsimiles and Reprints; 1977. Cronk, Sandra. Dark Night Journey: Inward Re-patterning Toward a Life Centered in God. Wallingford, PA:Pendle Hill Publications; 1991. JohnDonne, “The complete poetry and selected prose of John Donne” The Modem Library New York: 1952. Brijrai Singh, :Five seventeenth-Century poets”, Oxford university press; 1992. Herbert J.C Grierson, “Meta Physical Lyrics and poems" Oxford paper backs; 1996. H.G. Garrod, “John Donne poetry and prose: H.W. Garrod', Oxford press; 1992, Helen Gardner; “The Meta Physical poets”, New York: 1982 Carey, John. Jotm Donne; Life, Mind and Art. New York: Oxford UP; 1981 Carew, Thomas. The Poems of Thomas Carew with his Masque “Coelum Britannicum”. Ed. Rhodes Dunlap. 1949. Oxford: Clarendon P; 1970. Donne, John. The Complete Poetry of John Donne. Ed. John T. Shawcross. Garden City: Doubleday Anchor Books; 1976. ...... John Donne: Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions. Together with Death's Duels. 1959. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P; 1990. ..... John Donne: Selected Prose. Ed. Neil Rhodes. New York: Viking Penguin; 1987. Fallon, Robert Thomas. “Donne’s ‘Strange Fire’ and the ‘Elegies on the Authors Death.” John Donne Journal 7 (1988): 197-212 Fish, Stanley. “Biography and Intention.” Contesting the Subject: Essays in Postmodem Theory and Practice of Biography and Biographical Criticism. Ed. William H. Epstein. West Lafayette, Indiana: Purdue UP, 1991. Flynn, Dennis, “Awry and Squint’: The Dating of Donne's Holy Sonnets.” John Donne Journal 7 (1998):35-46. International Research Journal of Management Sociology & Humanity http:www.irjmsh.com Page 223