What do you think?
Rate this book
John Donne
Unparalleled in scope, this important volume provides the most comprehensive selection to date of Donne's works. In addition to the poems, it contains excerpts from all the prose writings, including such unfamiliar items as Donne's private letters, his comic onslaught on the Jesuits, Ignatius
His Conclave , and his defense of suicide in Biathanotos . In addition, Carey presents over 130 excerpts from sermons culled from Donne's sixteen-year preaching career, concluding with the full text of his last sermon, Death's Duel .
His Conclave , and his defense of suicide in Biathanotos . In addition, Carey presents over 130 excerpts from sermons culled from Donne's sixteen-year preaching career, concluding with the full text of his last sermon, Death's Duel .
528 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1633
6 people are currently reading
80 people want to read
About the author
John Donne
878 books701 followersJohn Donne was an English poet, preacher and a major representative of the metaphysical poets of the period. His works are notable for their realistic and sensual style and include sonnets, love poetry, religious poems, Latin translations, epigrams, elegies, songs, satires and sermons. His poetry is noted for its vibrancy of language and inventiveness of metaphor, especially as compared to that of his contemporaries.
Despite his great education and poetic talents, he lived in poverty for several years, relying heavily on wealthy friends. In 1615 he became an Anglican priest and, in 1621, was appointed the Dean of St Paul's Cathedral in London.
Despite his great education and poetic talents, he lived in poverty for several years, relying heavily on wealthy friends. In 1615 he became an Anglican priest and, in 1621, was appointed the Dean of St Paul's Cathedral in London.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
December 11, 2021
I'm not good at comprehending poetry, but it's a muscle I occasionally feel I should exercise a bit more. When I do, I figure going to the poets I already know I love (in my feeble way) is the most likely path to success. Hence this little volume of Donne. What a gift he had! I may not see all the meaning, but the beauty and brilliance are inescapable.
My only complaint (outside my own stupidity) is a couple of quibbles about this edition. A poet who was such a master of both rhyme and reason surely deserves the employment of both in the ordering of his works. Throwing the romantic and religious works in a blender and pouring them out in random order was a poor choice. Also, two narrators were used, and, rare for me with Naxos productions, I didn't care for one of them.
If someone knows of a completer, less chaotic, and beautifully read audio edition of Donne's writing, please point me to it!
My only complaint (outside my own stupidity) is a couple of quibbles about this edition. A poet who was such a master of both rhyme and reason surely deserves the employment of both in the ordering of his works. Throwing the romantic and religious works in a blender and pouring them out in random order was a poor choice. Also, two narrators were used, and, rare for me with Naxos productions, I didn't care for one of them.
If someone knows of a completer, less chaotic, and beautifully read audio edition of Donne's writing, please point me to it!
July 23, 2014
The poems are full of unexpected metaphors, original imagery, and startling paradoxes. Donne creates poems detailing ideal love.
I really enjoyed reading poems he wrote during a time of forced separation from his lover instructing her not to mourn during their time apart.
His love poems are said to be his early work, and his “Holy Sonnets” his later work. Donne’s most highly regarded verses are his “Songs” and “Sonnets”.
One of my favorites, was Valediction Forbidding Mourning. He does his best describing a positive way of looking at their temporary separation. These poems were a form of love letter and consolation present for his lover as way for them to avoid mourning.
He describes the death of “virtuous men.” dyeing without complaint, their farewell should be just as mild, he explains. He also believes in life after death, even though others doubt and question it.
I remember a stanza “so let us melt,” without the “tear floods” and “sigh-tempest,” Donne states he doesn’t want an announcement of their feelings. Their love is too sacred to be shared or expressed for others to understand. He goes on, stating the “laity” or the common people would disrespect their valued love. He highly values their love and relationship; their respect causes avoid doing anything that might make them appear cheap in any way.
He compares their death to an earth quake. The earth moving brings harms and fears; they experience “trepidation,” (vibration like spheres). He means even though their movements don’t have harmful consequences like an earthquake, their impact is greater and harmless. Their love has more power than an earthquake but its force won’t hurt anyone.
Later he contrasts the love of “dull sublunary lovers” with the love he and his beloved share. The difference is, his love is stronger. “Dull sublunary lovers” cannot survive separation; it removes that which constitutes the love itself. Donne explains other lovers are altogether physical and unable to experience separation without losing the sensation that compromises and sustains their love. He scorns physical love because lust isn’t consistent.
The love he shares with his beloved is refined and spiritual. They aren’t wholly physical; they are “Inter-assured of mind”. They love more than each others body, they love each others’ persona, and this is why they need not worry about missing “eyes, lips and hands.” Their love is on a much higher level than physical, they will still love each other regardless if they around to enjoy one another and even if something physically impairs the other.
Their souls are one. Since they are unified, him leaving doesn’t separate them; it expands the area of their unified soul, “like gold to airy thinness”, rather than cause a rift between them. No matter how far away from one another they may be, their love will only get stronger.
If they do have separate souls, he says they are as feet of a drafter’s compass, connected, with the center foot fixing the orbit of the outer foot and helping it to describe a perfect circle. Because his lover is so stable, her soul is the “foot” in the center, he is the foot that moves around it. The compass is a perfect image; this is why Donne utilizes it to concentrate on his values of ideal love.
Both are balanced, symmetrical, intellectual, serious, and beautiful with graceful simplicity. It is also how he perceives their love.
He sees her stability as the center of the relationship. He talks about leaning on each other and “hearkening after” They grow firm as they get older and closer they are always growing closer together. They will always push to spend more time together because they are excited to be around one another.
Finally he concludes his voyage as a “circle.” The circle is traditionally a symbol of perfection; he relates it to their relation ship because that is how he perceives their relationship. Also her firmness perfects their relationship, they follow after each other. They will always be long for each other, and cause them to end where they began.
I really enjoyed reading poems he wrote during a time of forced separation from his lover instructing her not to mourn during their time apart.
His love poems are said to be his early work, and his “Holy Sonnets” his later work. Donne’s most highly regarded verses are his “Songs” and “Sonnets”.
One of my favorites, was Valediction Forbidding Mourning. He does his best describing a positive way of looking at their temporary separation. These poems were a form of love letter and consolation present for his lover as way for them to avoid mourning.
He describes the death of “virtuous men.” dyeing without complaint, their farewell should be just as mild, he explains. He also believes in life after death, even though others doubt and question it.
I remember a stanza “so let us melt,” without the “tear floods” and “sigh-tempest,” Donne states he doesn’t want an announcement of their feelings. Their love is too sacred to be shared or expressed for others to understand. He goes on, stating the “laity” or the common people would disrespect their valued love. He highly values their love and relationship; their respect causes avoid doing anything that might make them appear cheap in any way.
He compares their death to an earth quake. The earth moving brings harms and fears; they experience “trepidation,” (vibration like spheres). He means even though their movements don’t have harmful consequences like an earthquake, their impact is greater and harmless. Their love has more power than an earthquake but its force won’t hurt anyone.
Later he contrasts the love of “dull sublunary lovers” with the love he and his beloved share. The difference is, his love is stronger. “Dull sublunary lovers” cannot survive separation; it removes that which constitutes the love itself. Donne explains other lovers are altogether physical and unable to experience separation without losing the sensation that compromises and sustains their love. He scorns physical love because lust isn’t consistent.
The love he shares with his beloved is refined and spiritual. They aren’t wholly physical; they are “Inter-assured of mind”. They love more than each others body, they love each others’ persona, and this is why they need not worry about missing “eyes, lips and hands.” Their love is on a much higher level than physical, they will still love each other regardless if they around to enjoy one another and even if something physically impairs the other.
Their souls are one. Since they are unified, him leaving doesn’t separate them; it expands the area of their unified soul, “like gold to airy thinness”, rather than cause a rift between them. No matter how far away from one another they may be, their love will only get stronger.
If they do have separate souls, he says they are as feet of a drafter’s compass, connected, with the center foot fixing the orbit of the outer foot and helping it to describe a perfect circle. Because his lover is so stable, her soul is the “foot” in the center, he is the foot that moves around it. The compass is a perfect image; this is why Donne utilizes it to concentrate on his values of ideal love.
Both are balanced, symmetrical, intellectual, serious, and beautiful with graceful simplicity. It is also how he perceives their love.
He sees her stability as the center of the relationship. He talks about leaning on each other and “hearkening after” They grow firm as they get older and closer they are always growing closer together. They will always push to spend more time together because they are excited to be around one another.
Finally he concludes his voyage as a “circle.” The circle is traditionally a symbol of perfection; he relates it to their relation ship because that is how he perceives their relationship. Also her firmness perfects their relationship, they follow after each other. They will always be long for each other, and cause them to end where they began.
April 18, 2024
John Donne: Great English Poets, by Peter Porter.
Delightful assortment of Donne’s poetry, with a wonderful collection of coloured paintings throughout this hard-cover book. I’m so glad I found this edition. *****
"It was during this period of eclipse that Donne wrote his most impassioned religious poetry, in particular the Holy Sonnets. These superbly wrought products of his guilt are really poems in search of faith, not statements of belief." (p11)
"However extreme the conceits and comparisons, his writing is always true to the naturalistic surface of life. Nothing can stale these audacious poems. They are exaggerations we know to be more true than any measured description could ever be." (p12)
Poems include:
“The Sun Rising” - Opens with “Busy old fool, unruly son…” ABBA CDCD EE. Deflating the overrated, elevating the worthy. This guy feels the world in a sensational perspective.
“Break of Day” - Rhyming couplets. Good poem about not being so busy that you miss daily ‘life’.
“A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning” - “So let us melt …” Farewell at the death of a soul-mate. Surely this had been read by Emily Bronte and influenced her poetic expressions and novel ‘Wuthering Heights’, e.g. “Our two souls therefore, which are one..”
“The Relic” - How can this not be an influence for ‘Wuthering Heights’? Look at this poem! It opens with:
“When my grave is broke up again
Some second guest to entertain,
(For graves have learn'd that woman head,
To be to more than one a bed)
And he that digs it, spies
A bracelet of bright hair about the bone,
Will he not let'us alone,
And think that there a loving couple lies,
Who thought that this device might be some way
To make their souls, at the last busy day,
Meet at this grave, and make a little stay?”
“Death, Be Not Proud. Holy Sonnet X” - “Death, thou shalt die.”
“Batter My Heart, Three-Person’d God - Holy Sonnet XIV” - One of my all-time favourite poems, an anthem, a mantra “.. you ravish me.”
………………………………………………..
Delightful assortment of Donne’s poetry, with a wonderful collection of coloured paintings throughout this hard-cover book. I’m so glad I found this edition. *****
"It was during this period of eclipse that Donne wrote his most impassioned religious poetry, in particular the Holy Sonnets. These superbly wrought products of his guilt are really poems in search of faith, not statements of belief." (p11)
"However extreme the conceits and comparisons, his writing is always true to the naturalistic surface of life. Nothing can stale these audacious poems. They are exaggerations we know to be more true than any measured description could ever be." (p12)
Poems include:
“The Sun Rising” - Opens with “Busy old fool, unruly son…” ABBA CDCD EE. Deflating the overrated, elevating the worthy. This guy feels the world in a sensational perspective.
“Break of Day” - Rhyming couplets. Good poem about not being so busy that you miss daily ‘life’.
“A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning” - “So let us melt …” Farewell at the death of a soul-mate. Surely this had been read by Emily Bronte and influenced her poetic expressions and novel ‘Wuthering Heights’, e.g. “Our two souls therefore, which are one..”
“The Relic” - How can this not be an influence for ‘Wuthering Heights’? Look at this poem! It opens with:
“When my grave is broke up again
Some second guest to entertain,
(For graves have learn'd that woman head,
To be to more than one a bed)
And he that digs it, spies
A bracelet of bright hair about the bone,
Will he not let'us alone,
And think that there a loving couple lies,
Who thought that this device might be some way
To make their souls, at the last busy day,
Meet at this grave, and make a little stay?”
“Death, Be Not Proud. Holy Sonnet X” - “Death, thou shalt die.”
“Batter My Heart, Three-Person’d God - Holy Sonnet XIV” - One of my all-time favourite poems, an anthem, a mantra “.. you ravish me.”
………………………………………………..
May 24, 2022
4 / 5 stars
"Wee can dye by it, if not live by love,
And if unfit for tombes and hearse
Our legend bee, it will be fit for verse"
- Donne, "The Canonization"
John Donne is quite the character. Although not my all-time favourite poet and writer, he does bring readers to a state of melancholic happiness - creating such juxtaposition is quite common, but Donne adapts this to his own flair and personality.
I found myself laughing at certain poems for their overdramatic love-sick style, but then again, I would also find myself deeply sighing in woe as his heartbroken words filled my heart...
Either way, his melodrama entertained me!
"Wee can dye by it, if not live by love,
And if unfit for tombes and hearse
Our legend bee, it will be fit for verse"
- Donne, "The Canonization"
John Donne is quite the character. Although not my all-time favourite poet and writer, he does bring readers to a state of melancholic happiness - creating such juxtaposition is quite common, but Donne adapts this to his own flair and personality.
I found myself laughing at certain poems for their overdramatic love-sick style, but then again, I would also find myself deeply sighing in woe as his heartbroken words filled my heart...
Either way, his melodrama entertained me!
June 3, 2022
Definitely need to read more stuff by this looney toon. In an age of so much rote cynicism about existence this book is genuinely refreshing, bracing, and sends the mind whirling with new thoughts!
October 21, 2024
Can't say I missed reading Elizabethan poetry
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews