Cassie McKenzie

Melissa Jacques
March 26, y

Interpreting Rejection

The Woman in The Flea

The unwanted advances of a man are, unfortunately, something almost every woman has to

deal with in one way or another. In John Donnes poem The Flea, there are three characters;

The Flea, the Woman, and the Speaker. The Speaker is trying to convince the Woman to have sex

with him, and his arguments revolve around the Flea. However, for all his efforts, he is rejected.

Im arguing that the Woman is not interested in the Speaker, and the only reason she sticks

around is because his arguments are creative and mildly interesting.

Firstly, the Speaker is trying to have sex with a woman hes just met, in what is assumed to

be a bar or casual public place. The Speaker views the Woman as a virgin who cares about

societys opinion about unmarried sex. He uses his information to try to dissuade her assumed

fears about the sin of unmarried sex, as a church-loving virgin wouldnt want to tarnish her

reputation. His primary argument seems to be that since the Flea has bitten both of them, their

two bloods mingled (4) is more intimate than sex would be. His argument is one of damage

control instead of playing up his good traits, which would be expected of a man with such verbal

prowess. This seems confusing until he references the fact that she has already deniest [his] (2)

proposal. These words tell the reader directly that the Woman has said no to him before the

monologue even began. His attempt to seduce her with the Flea is ultimately doomed from the

start because she has already rejected his advances.

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 Continuing in the second stanza, the Speaker compares the Flea to a marriage bed and

claims that they are essentially married already (13). This, of course, is a strategy that allows

himself to remain untethered from actual marriage. She seems unconvinced by his argument, and

his words apt to kill me (16) and spare (10) insinuate that she was moving to swat the flea

both before he used it to represent their marriage. The Woman then continues to actually kill

the Flea, after he begged her not to kill it. According to these lines, it seems that his arguments

had very little influence on her. In class discussions, people have claimed that her killing the flea

could have been flirty, somehow. Realistically, the Speaker applies the words cruel and sudden

(19) to her actions, which is fairly far from being wet and willing.

Following this, the Speaker is very persistent in his advances, and yet the woman has

shown no outward attraction or interest in what he is proposing. After killing the Flea, the

Woman says that she Findst not thy self, nor me the weaker now; (23-24), denying having

been effected. With a caesura and characteristic bluntness, she destroys the metaphysical

representation of their marriage bed. This is the first thing she has said since the implied no

before the poem began, which only emphasizes her silence throughout the rest of their dialogue.

The Womans disinterest is highlighted in every action she takes. Shes unimpressed with the

Speaker at this point, shooting down his arguments quietly but clearly. The interaction that we

see is almost entirely the Speaker trying to persuade her to sleep with him, which is a little sad.

Hes desperate and shes silently watching him, there simply because the Speaker is entertaining.

To summarize, John Donne gives just a few clues as to the Womans thoughts on the

Speaker, but the contextual clues are enough for us to tell that she is disinterested in his

advances. There are those who argue that her not leaving during his monologue means shes

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interested, but the content makes it fairly obvious that she is not considering him as a sexual

prospect.

WORKS CITED:

Donne, John, The Flea, The Norton Introduction to Literature, Booth, Alison, Hunter,

Paul, Mays, Kelly, 9th ed. W. W. Norton, 2006