[ZENITH EDUCATION GER ww-Zenbaucaon no COMPILED BY. Zubair Ahmad Qureshi Cell:0334-8000330, JOHN DONNE Assignment # 1: Donne as a Love Poet Donne's treatment of love-is-entizelyunconyentionalHe does nowfall in line with the ways and modes of feclisfg/and expressionsfound'ih the Elizabethan love poctry. Most of the Elizabethan poétyfollowedethe fashion’ set by Petrarch, -an.Tialian sonneteer, in their treatment of love. According to that fashion the lover was always subject, humble and obsequious (over-respectful). Obedience to his mistress's wishes was his chicf virtue. He sighed, wept, yearned, pingdand languished for her. Besides, the lover’s entreaty or entreaties to hig tady,"hi®) courtly wooing, the beloved’s indifference, jand the self-pity of the lovers were common themes in Patriarchian poems. Alike themesFaye Bien Feateeby, DORTSIbuR IN Guitea BASEN way. What makes him distindt from) others, is*thal he“ establishes aw fetaphysieal relationship between body and souf, aid feeling and-thought The love, which Donne portrays, “is not “impagsioned courtly® or chivalric but intellectual in which art plays predominant part. According to Dryden, “He perplexes the minds of the fair sex with nice speculation of philosophy when he should engage their heart and entertain with softness of love.” Grierson speaks of his poetry thus, “Donne's poetry is metaphysical not only in the sense of being erudite and witty but also in the proper sense of being reflective and philosophical.”[ZENITH EDUCATION GER ww-Zenbaucaon no COMPILED BY. Zubair Ahmad Qureshi Cell:0334-8000330, Donne's love poetry is chiefly remarkable for the range and variety of moods and altitudes. There are three distinct sirains -- cynical, conjugal and Platonic love in his poetry. At the lowest level, there is the aspect of sensual love, expressed by Donne. He believes in “Rfailty thy name is woman!” On the Other hand. he rejects the lofty cult of the woman, She is no.deity or goddess.to be worshipped, Thus. she is essentially a bundle of contradictions{ This two| fold-attitudes{owards woman/depends upon the situation and mood ofithe-pdet! Such attitude istbest rekcaléd in The Song: Go and catch a falling star’, where he says that nowhere lives a woman true and fair even when one travels the whole globe. He endgsbis song with a bitter mocking, cynicism and denunciation of the fair sex. “And swear No where Lives wwontan, trugand dairy This is a brilliant piece of mockery when He settles hiS@argumi@At and asserts in the same song. “Yetshee ‘Will bee False, ere I come, to two, or three.” Moreover, even in his defeat, Donne rises superior to the woman, In ‘Twieknam Garden’, also, he refers to woman as the perverse sex, and says that it is wrong to judge a woman’s thoughts by her tears. Exploring more of Donne’s poems, we find that his poems are not concemed with limited number of moods of love as was the case with the Elizabethan lyrics of love. In his poems, there is the variety of moods, even the mood of fulfillment and joy of consummated love, which was absent in the Elizabethan lyrics. Donne also appears to be fully conscious of the basis of true love, as he does not feel shy of expressing the delight of fully consummated passion, In the poems, “The Sun Rising”, “The Good[ZENITH EDUCATION GER ww-Zenbaucaon no COMPILED BY. Zubair Ahmad Qureshi Cell:0334-8000330, Morrow”, “The Anniversary” etc, his attitude is not cynical tawards woman. Here is found the fulfillment of mutual passion. The total fulfillment and glory of love is echoed in “The Good Morrow”. In Donne’s earlier poems which are of cynical view, woman is solely as an object of physical love or desire. But in his later love poems, his attitude is mature, he sees woman as a companion in the fulfillment of passion, both physical and spiritual In the poems addressed t6/his wife Anne-Mofe thé(poet deals, printarily with the joys of fulfilled and consuitimaléd Yove!/Here-is anfentire experience /Of. the triumph of satisfaction and mutual love. “he Anniversarie” is a noble and impassioned hymn of conjugal bliss. Donne regards “marrieddeve” as immortal as it will persist even in the grave, He states in “The Anniversarié® “All other things, to their destruction draw, Only our love hath no decay; his, nojto Mourswhath-wor yesterday” Grierson’s remark in this Fegard is worth-nofing: ““The Anniversarie” remains; despite-of alt its faults, one of the greatest poems on love.” Likewise, the song beginning with “Sweetest love” is addressed to his wife when he leaves her on the occasion of undertaking a joumey into a foreign country. There is a perfect quality of love between the lover and the sweetheart. Both the lover and the lady are grieved at parting, but the lover, being a man and a scholar can deduce some higher thoughts from even this experience, which sooth and calm both of them. So this timely separation is like a short sleep. “But think that we Are but turn’d aside to sleep; ‘They who one another keep Alive, ne’er parted be.”[ZENITH EDUCATION GER ww-Zenbaucaon no COMPILED BY. Zubair Ahmad Qureshi Cell:0334-8000330, Furthermore, the poems like, “A Valediction, Forbidding Mourning” and “A Valediction of Weeping” reveal the poet eternal faith in love and life. The similarity drawn between the lovers and the feet of compass is much appreciated by Coleridge who says: “Nothing was ever more than the figure of the compas: Moreover, rejoining of be cieircling foot Suggésts)sthe |retumaéf the poct to his beloved in spite of theif Sepliinte identities. “Thy firmness makes my circle just, And make me endgyhere I begunne.” In this way, the best love poems are inde@@ thie which show the fulfillment of happy married life. Donne's love poetry=ispa ‘teeord” off moqdswHeytriestyy ascertain aymetaphysical relationship betweén| the |body|and the sul. Sextial love Treateeeyen as holy love in “The Extasie” thus bridging Betwéen the>cyni¢al and-Platonie“strands, Donne has artistically explained thatthe body and the soul are mytuallydependent and that one soul cannot be united with the bther soul Gxéspetitrauigh the medidm of physical love To conclude, we can confidently state that there is not just a single mood in Donne’s love poetry. There are several moods and sentiments fused into a single poem, Passion h Patriarchian convention and robust arrogance all mingle in a single poem. The fact is that, his capacity for experience is unique, and his conscience makes compromise in the duty of doing justice to cach,[ZENITH EDUCATION GER ww-Zenbaucaon no COMPILED BY. Zubair Ahmad Qureshi Cell:0334-8000330, Assignment #2: Donne as a Metaphysical Poet The term “metaphysical poetry” implies the characteristics of complexity, intellectual tone, abundance of subtle wit, fusion of intellect and emotion, colloquial argumentative tone, conceits (which are always witty and sometimes fantastic), scholarly allusions, dramatic tone, and philosophic or reflective element. Donne has béen classified both by Dryden and Samuel Johnson_as a Metaphysical poet. This title has beer conferred] on hint Beedle jot his, sudden’ flights from the material to the spiritual Sphéby and.also bocatse.6f his Obscurity whigh is occasionally baffling. His works abounds in wit and conceits. In addition to this, he has been termed a metaphysical poet because hig, style is overwhelmed with obscure philosophical allusions and subtle and abéftaptieferences to science and religion. Donne’s poetry may be called metaphysical only in as for as its technique or style is concerned. Griersomspeaksjof his-poetrythusy “Donne’s poetry is metaphysical not oWlly inthe Sense OPbeing Prudiite und witty but also in the proper sense of being reflective und philosophical.” Donne is antisPatriarchiay; he Uoes not follew-th&eehtaht atitidéteward woman. But he is also proficient of profound feelings. The poems such as “The Good Morrow” and “The Anniversary” are, on the one hand, great love lyrics while on the other hand, raise the great metaphysical question of the relation of spirit and senses. ‘The chief characteristics of Donne's metaphysical poetry may be pointed out as follows. Donne and his followers made an excessive use of conceits. While in Shakespeare or Sydney a conceit is an ornament or an occasional grace, in Donne it is everywhere. It is his very genius, and fashions his feelings and thought. Donne's conceits are more intellectual than those of Shakespeare or[ZENITH EDUCATION GER ww-Zenbaucaon no COMPILED BY. Zubair Ahmad Qureshi Cell:0334-8000330, It is chiefly on account of the excessive use of intellectual and far-fetched conceits that Donne is known as a metaphysical poet. Of course, all comparisons discover likeness in things unlike. Donne often employs fantastic comparisons. The most famous and striking one is the comparison of a man who travels and his beloved who stays at home to a pair of compasses, in “A Val on: Forbidding Mourning”. “And though it in the centre sit, ‘Yet when the other far doth roam, Jt leans..and hearkens after it, Anid grows etect, asdhat eomesthome.”? His use of strange anf@fart¥ethed/ conceits may. also\be illustrated. from the other poems included in our syllabus. In*The Song: Go and catch a falling star’, the whole of the first stanza contains a series of-gonceits. The poet asks to catch a falling star, get a mandrake root and find )Ouf who cleft the devil's foot. In *The Anniversary’, each of the lovers is a kisig with théther as the subject. Here upowearth were Kingssanderone but we Can be sich Kings{nor‘of such subjects bes ‘Who/is so'safeas-we? where non€¢an'do Treason to us, exceptone ous tyy In ‘Twicknam Garden*-the poets Tove is ikea Spider Which céfWerts the beauty of spring into poison, Being more often intellectual than emotional, these conceits make Donne's poetry difficult. They puzzle and perplex us. At the same time when we succeed in understanding them, we feel a certain pleasure as we feel after having solved a difficult mathematical problem. Donne's originality in diction includes words not merely from the vocabulary of science but from colloquialism, He selected colloquial diction which has vigor, freshness and originality. He discards literary words and phrases which became rusty because of repetition. The vigor of colloquialism is evident in his poem ‘The Good Morrow’, as the opening lines given below show:[ZENITH EDUCATION GER ww-Zenbaucaon no COMPILED BY. Zubair Ahmad Qureshi Cell:0334-8000330, “I wonder by my troth, what thou and I Did till we lov'd...” Donne was the first English poet who has used facts of scientific discoveries of his time in the poetry-- the objects, which are utilized in the laboratories such as compasses, and the globe with the maps of earth pasted on it, and various other objects derived front VarOUS BRANCHES OF SCIEHCE HIKE BIOIORY. PHYSICS ae chemistry ete, Such kind of imagery_was entirely uncxpected at that time. He also achieved new vocabulary from the world of trade and eomincrcey thelarts and thedcience. Donne's poems have plenty of wit, as defined by Dr. Johnson, in relation with the metaphysical |poets. His coneeits indeed axe, startling, but ultimately just. The poet often proves their truth. The ability to @abofate a conceit to its farthest possibility without losing the sense of its appropriftenesspBiks for a high intellectual caliber. The compasses image in ‘A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning’ is an intricate conceit which is logically deyelapedsbysDonne=Moreover hisrdisplayrof wit can be seen in his humordus and /satiric remarks asin*The Seng: GoWnd Catch a Falling St Metaphysical poetry is argiimentauve. Theres Subtle evolutibi of thought as the poet advances arguments to prove his point. He is often like a lawyer choosing the fittest arguments for the case. Donne is always fond of logical sequences, ingenious and far-fetched analysis. In “The Anniversarie” there is a find blend of passion and logic, deep feeling and intellectual analysis. Donne's conception of true love is something abiding, something that dwells permanently in the soul, “All other things, to their destruction draw, Only our love hath no decay; This, no tomorrow hath, nor yesterday.”