John Donne - The Sun Rising

             "Metaphysical" love poetry such as John Donne's "The Sun Rising" has certain characteristics and features. The frequent use of colloquial speech stresses the occasional quality of the poems in the sense that they often seem to rise out of a specific occasion, and in some cases, they even seem to be deliberately provocative. Further characteristics are the elaborate and innovative "metaphysical" metaphors, that deliberately distance the tenor from the vehicle, thus stressing the unusual and original by startling contrasts. Also intricate rhythmical patterns aim towards wit and originality. The love poetry often features a deliberate intellectualization of emotional states (love); The lover becomes a logician instead of a suffering victim, and the poetry addresses the mind rather than the heart. Although metaphysical love poems acknowledge the poetic tradition of the renaissance - the Petrarchian love sonnet as a part of the courtly love tradition - it nevertheless represents a distinct break with that tradition according to form and content. Since I find it impossible to touch upon all of the above characteristics in a limited analysis like this one, the following aims to point to the ways, in which Donne's love poem treats a traditional theme in an innovative manner by turning the Petrarchian conceits up side down, creating instead a poetical universe that not only demands an imaginative effort on the part of the reader but also seems to challenge, provoke and transcend a well established literary tradition.
             "Busy old fool, unruly sun/ Why dost thou thus/ Through windows and through curtains call on us?"(ll.. 1-3).
             The opening lines of the first stanza of Donne's "The Sun Rising" are constructed in intricate, varying and abrupt rhythmical patterns that seem to mirror the speaker's state of mind. In an emotional outburst he scolds the sun for intruding on him and his mistress. The scene is set as a colloquial dialogue between th...

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John Donne - The Sun Rising. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 03:23, March 29, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/7205.html