John Donne

1
John Donnes

• A Valediction Forbidding Mourning
• Batter My Heart

2
Valediction

• As virtuous men pass mildly away,
• And whisper to their souls to go,
• Whilst some of their sad friends do say
• The breath goes now, and some say, No
• ll 1-4
• What meaning does the word as have?
• How do virtuous men die?
• What do their friends disagree about?

3
Valediction

• So let us melt, and make no noise,
• No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move
• Twere profanation of our joys
• To tell the laity our love.
• ll 5-8
• Who is the poet addressing?
• What is the extended simile?
• Why does he want their parting to be quiet? Why
  is this different than Renaissance poets?

4
Valediction

• Moving of th earth brings harms and fears,
• Men reckon what it did and meant
• But trepidation of the spheres,
• Though greater far, is innocent.
• ll 9-12
• What is the moving of the earth?
• What is a trepidation of the spheres?
• Why might the latter be innocent in contrast to
  the former?

5
Valediction

• Dull sublunary lovers love
• (Whose soul is sense) cannot admit
• Absence, because it doth remove
• Those things which elemented it.
• ll 13-16
• What does soul is sense mean?
• What is the poet saying about love?

6
Valediction

• But we, by a love so much refined
• That our selves know not what it is,
• Inter-assured of the mind,
• Care less, eyes, lips and hands to miss.
• ll 17-20
• How is their love different than that of the
  previous lovers?

7
Valediction

• Our two souls therefore, which are one,
• Though I must go, endure not yet
• A breach, but an expansion,
• Like gold to airy thinness beat.
• ll 21-24
• What is the importance of therefore?
• Explain the comparison to gold

8
Valediction

• If they be two, they are two so
• As stiff twin compasses are two
• They soul, the fixed foot, makes no show
• To move, but doth, if th other do.
• ll 25-28
• If their souls are not one soul, what does the
  poet suggest they act like? Explain this
  metaphysical conceit (which is the most famous of
  them all!)

9
Valediction

• And though it in the center sit,
• Yet when the other far doth roam,
• It leans and hearkens after it,
• And grows erect, as that comes home
• ll 29-32
• Explain the development of the metaphysical
  conceit.
• What is the double entrendre in line 32?

10
Valediction

• Such wilt thou be to me, who must,
• Like th other foot, obliquely run
• Thy firmness makes my circle just,
• And makes me end where I begun.
• ll 33-36
• What is the meaning of obliquely?
• Explain line 35

11
Valediction

• Some have argued this might be an
  autobiographical poem. If so, what do you think
  it is referring to?
• Why is this poem classified as metaphysical
  poetry?

12
Batter My Heart from the Holy Sonnets

• What is the rhyme structure? (which is typical
  for his Holy Sonnets)
• What is the theme generally presented in the
  couplet?

13
Batter My Heart

• Batter my heart, three-personed God for you
• As yet but knock, breathe, shine and seek to
  mend
• That I may rise and stand, oerthrow me, and
  bend
• Your force to break, blow, burn and make me new.
  
• ll 1-4
• What is the three-personed God?
• What is the first-person narrator asking for?

14
Batter My Heart

• I, like an usurped town, to another due,
• Labor to admit you, but O, to no end
• Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
• But is captived, and proves weak or untrue.
• ll 5-8
• Who is the another in line 5?
• What is the simile?
• Paraphrase lines 7 8

15
Batter My Heart

• Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
• But am betrothed unto your enemy.
• Divorce me, untie or break that knot again
• Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
• Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
• Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.
• ll 9-14
• Who is the speaker betrothed to?
• What is the theme of the couplet?
• Have we previously in the poem (say around lines
  3 and 4) seen language of violence? Why is this
  significant?

16

• Your homework for tomorrow
• John Donnes Meditation 17