John Donne

life

1572 He was born in London into a wealthy Roman
Catholic family

1591 after studying at Oxford, returned to London to study law

1598 became secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton, one of the highest officials in queen Elizabeth’s government

1601 He married Egerton’s niece, 17-year old Ann More,
secretly;

1615 after converting to Anglicanism became Dean of Saint Paul's Cathedral

1631 he died and was buried
in Saint Paul’s Cathedral

works

Satires and love lyrics, Songs and Sonnets (1633).

Divine Poems (1607) and two anti-Catholic pamphlets
which were his public renunciation of the Catholic faith

Holy Sonnets (about 1618): they sometimes praise,
sometimes struggle with God’s transcendent perfection.

poetry

are dramatic monologues;

use wit and unusual, intellectual metaphors called ‘conceits’

use a variety of tone and register

employ a speaking voice which takes on many
inflections and intonations:

from an assertive to a meditative tone;

from coarse cynicism to enigmatic irony.

themes

the struggle between the spiritual and the physical;

women’s inconstancy;

mortality: what happens to man after death?

the nature of faith and the limits of human existence.