John Donne


 * Criticized by neo-classicists
 * Due to disdain for “some of the liberties he takes”
 * Does not conform to standards upheld by Johnson and other neo-classicists
 * Breached limits of decorum in his poetry
 * Metaphysical poet
 * Most famous
 * “Metaphysical conceit” – used metaphors that were jarring, “Lovers’ eyeballs threaded on a string.” Elaborate metaphors that he made, “metaphors on crack”
 * Metaphysical originally used as derisive term, coined by Samuel Johnson
 * “Yoking together with violence” of dissimilar ideas of concepts, ideas, and images
 * A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
 * Spiritual love vs. earthly love
 * Written to lover/ wife(?) upon some kind of separation
 * Reassure her not to despair
 * Spiritual love can be sustained no matter the distance
 * Holy Sonnets
 * Bring together religious and physical ideas, almost uncomfortably
 * “Sexy sonnets”