The aim of this assignment is to depict the various differences and similarities in Donne’s courtly sonnets and holy sonnet sequence, with reference to “A Valediction Forbidding Mourning” and “Holy Sonnet XIV”.
“A Valediction Forbidding Mourning” depicts through various conceits and metaphors the theme of the bond between two lovers who are separated physically, but are not ready to sacrifice their relationship and passion due to the mere fact that they are separated by distance. This poem portrays the undying earthly love between two individuals through the famous conceit of the two feet of a compass through the lines:
As stiff twin compasses are two;
Thy soul, the fixed foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if the other do.
John Freccero states that: “The poem reversed a traditional figure and gave to the neo-Petrarchan dialectic of presence and absence a new metaphysical meaning. As …show more content…
One can analyse this state and compare it with Donne’s concept of a renewed life in “Holy Sonnet XIV” as how Arthur L. Clemens states: “From Genesis on, the Father is referred to as the giver of life to man by breathing into his nostrils the breath of life. This is at least relevant to the sonnet since Donne is asking for new, innocent life, as was given Adam before the Fall: "make me new."”
The renewal through the spirit of God can also be referred to the instance when Christ appeared to His disciples after Resurrection, as told in the Bible as "he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost" (John 20: 22).
In “A Valediction Forbidding Mourning” Donne presents the idea of their love that is refined and beyond human emotions attached to physical love through the lines:
But we by a love so much refined,
That our selves know not what it
“A Valediction Forbidding Mourning” depicts through various conceits and metaphors the theme of the bond between two lovers who are separated physically, but are not ready to sacrifice their relationship and passion due to the mere fact that they are separated by distance. This poem portrays the undying earthly love between two individuals through the famous conceit of the two feet of a compass through the lines:
As stiff twin compasses are two;
Thy soul, the fixed foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if the other do.
John Freccero states that: “The poem reversed a traditional figure and gave to the neo-Petrarchan dialectic of presence and absence a new metaphysical meaning. As …show more content…
One can analyse this state and compare it with Donne’s concept of a renewed life in “Holy Sonnet XIV” as how Arthur L. Clemens states: “From Genesis on, the Father is referred to as the giver of life to man by breathing into his nostrils the breath of life. This is at least relevant to the sonnet since Donne is asking for new, innocent life, as was given Adam before the Fall: "make me new."”
The renewal through the spirit of God can also be referred to the instance when Christ appeared to His disciples after Resurrection, as told in the Bible as "he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost" (John 20: 22).
In “A Valediction Forbidding Mourning” Donne presents the idea of their love that is refined and beyond human emotions attached to physical love through the lines:
But we by a love so much refined,
That our selves know not what it