Assignment no 02

Classical Poetry

Topic: Donne’s Philosophy Of Love

To: Sir ShamShad

By: Shukraan Bin Umer

(17511502-028)

BS ENG V-A

Dept Of English
John Donne’s Philosophy of Love

John Donne is considered the founder or the leading figure of the metaphysical poetry. His
poetry is considered a top-notch love poet among other Renaissance poets. His love poetry is
varied in its expression and style as it does not tilt towards the Petrarchan style completely but
rather develops in a totally different direction, though there is sometimes use of the Petrarchan
style and rhyme.

Donne’s philosophy of love also diverges from the idea of love of other poets of the same age.
His idea of love is not restricted to just one static idea or emotion but rather it is an
amalgamation of multitudes of expressions and emotions. It is an evolutionary experience. At
first, his love was directed towards women, and later it turned into the love for his wife Anne
Moore, and then it turned into the love for God as seen in his Holy sonnets or divine poems.

His poetry is varied in its expression. It has a subtle variation. There is deep knowledge and
comprehensive variation too. There is the use of vibrant language and intellectual metaphors
which are quite different from those of his peers. His poetry is a reflection and representative of
his philosophy of love with new concepts and experiences. There are different experiences
intermixed and are quite complex. There is a complex blend of emotions.

Donne’s poetry reflects his life and his experiences. There are all types and forms of love such as
platonic love, conjugal love, cynical love, and divine love. His poems’ tone and mood contain
his personal experiences. There is sincerity, brutal honesty, and seriousness enriched and
intertwined with the simplest of expressions. Like an experienced and skilled lawyer, he argues
and proves his argument about love in his poems. He constantly pushes in the form of arguments
and examples to express his point.

In the poem “The Good Morrow”, he welcomes the lovers because they have reached a special
kind of confidence and matureness. He addresses the sun in a very bold and bossy manner. In
this poem, the lover’s love is depicted as one that is filled with warmth and passion of the youth.
The lover is not even afraid of the archaic sun and even dares to call it a saucy wretch and a fool
that doesn’t know any better and is constantly meddling in the affairs of the lovers. He even tells
the sun to visit all of the Earth and tell him at the end if all the glory and wealth of the wealth can
be equal to his beloved who lies in his arms. Nothing can compare to his happiness and
possession that comes from the love both have for each other and it is such that nothing else in
the world matters to them. The Platonic love can be best summarized from this poem of John
Donne.

Another aspect with which Donne differentiates himself is in the use of imagery and language.
There are tons of allusions and conceits which are very farfetched and intellectualized references
which may be difficult to understand for the uneducated. For example, in his poem “A
valediction: Forbidden mourning”, he compares the parting of lovers in the form of an image
of the two parts of a compass. There is no comparing to the Gods in his poetry. He says that his
memory and remembrance of his beloved is enough to bring comfort to him even if he is not
with his beloved in the flesh. Even if they are parted by physical distance, their souls are in
harmony with each other and are tied to one another by the inexplicable bond of Conjugal love.

Donne doesn’t only talk of love but also talks about the involved parties, mainly the female. He
criticises the role of women and their unpredictability as they might not be faithful to one person
through their whole life and might be unfaithful. All other impossible things may be possible but
this alone is not possible that a woman may be faithful and fair at the same time. This is utmost
impossibility according to Donne. (Go and Catch a falling star) he is of the view that even if by

Some kind of miracle, there is a woman who is both fair and faithful, it is of no use going to
meet her as if going on a pilgrimage because when he will finally reach at her door, she is likely
to have betrayed and been disloyal to many lovers. The presence of the strain of Cynical love
can be felt in this song.

In the poem “the sun rising”, he talks about the love the lover has for the beloved spanning the
whole world for. For the lover, the whole world is condensed into the existence of his beloved
and she alone is worth more than everything else in the world. She is all the states of the world
and he is all the princes of the world and as all the states are for princes to rule and govern, he
too shall govern and rule and conquer his lady.

(Donne & Bell, 2012) “She’s all states, and all princes I, Nothing else is.”

In the poem “Lovers’ Infiniteness”, he talks about the acquisition of all of his lady’s love. His
love is like a promise and a bargain between the lover and the beloved, a heart in exchange for a
heart. Love for love. He talks about sighs and other “treasures” of his with which he bargained
for the love of his lady and it seems it is not enough but he cannot bring out any more of the
treasures. He expresses that if he can’t have all of his lady’s love, it is because she didn’t give
him all of her heart at the time of the bargain as she already partially loved someone else. He
who already has everything or all of the love cannot ask for more love from his companion as it
would be illogical to want something that you already possess completely.

There are also poems about the mutual love and the joys and happiness the lovers enjoy as a
result of the love. In this case, there is joy and contentment, it is expressed in many poems like
“the sun rising”, “the good morrow” etc.

Donne’s treatment of love is very realistic and it not skewed towards idealism as others’ is. He
knows the joys and sorrows, the contentment and the resentments, the pleasures of sex, and the
meeting in secret by the lovers. He also tries to establish a connection between the soul and the
body and his love is not purely a physical love but also a spiritual one. It is the love of one soul
to another, one divine body to another. There is no physicality needed if the love has transcended
the fleshy bodies and has already seeped into the souls of the lovers. Physical unions are not the
necessity but rather a convenience. This philosophy of Donne can be found in his poem “A
valediction: Forbidden Mourning”.

Conclusion:
Donne’s genius temperament and educated expressions give his poems such powerful impact and
fascination that it is very captivating and stunning for the readers. The whole tone and feeling his
poetry gives is vastly different from those of other Elizabethan poets. There is diversity in his
poems and his ideas about love and union. He has a different outlook towards love. We can even
say that he has love for love itself. He is in love with the idea of love and not the phenomenon
itself. This may be a bold conjecture but it holds true if we examine and analyze parts of his
poetry. It is magnetic and attractive due to his subtle use of conceits, metaphors, allusions,
imagery, hyperboles, and irony. There is a blend of feelings and thoughts which converge to
form an organic whole which bewitches the readers into delving deeply in his ideas and
expressions about love. We can say that his philosophy of love is very unique and can be
considered a masterpiece of literature even by the past and today’s standards. In short, Donne
can be considered the best love poet and artist as well as a philosopher of a separate school of
thought regarding the role and form of love between lovers.