Poetry

The Metaphysical Poets

•Poetry tended to be more personal and more private.

•It was often published for only a limited circle of readers. •The term ‘metaphysical’ was used to describe their work by the 18th critic, Samuel Johnson. •Johnson intended the adjective to be pejorative. He attacked the poets’ lack of feeling, their learning and the surprising range of images and comparisons they used. •The Metaphysical term is now used to describe the modern impact of their writing.

•They used contemporary scientific discoveries and theories, the topical debates on humanism, faith, and eternity, colloquial speech-based rhythms, and innovative verse forms

•To examine the relationship between the individual, his God, and the universe. •Their ‘conceits’, mataphors and images, paradoxes and intellectual complexity make the poems a constant challenge to the reader. •John Donne and George Herbert can be seen as experimenters both in poetic form and the subject matter they used. They were also innovators in linguistic directness of expression. •They reflected in poetry the intellectual and spiritual challenges of an age which wanted to expand human horizons.

John Donne was born in 1572 in London, England. He is known as the founder of the Metaphysical Poets, a term created by Samuel Johnson, an eighteenth-century English essayist, poet, and philosopher.

THE FLEA.
by John Donne

MARK but this flea, and mark in this,
How little that which thou deniest me is ;
It suck'd me first, and now sucks thee,
And in this flea our two bloods mingled be.
Thou know'st that this cannot be said
A sin, nor shame, nor loss of maidenhead ;
Yet this enjoys before it woo,
And pamper'd swells with one blood made of two ;
And this, alas ! is more than we would do.

O stay, three lives in one flea spare,
Where we almost, yea, more than married are.
This flea is you and I, and this
Our marriage bed, and marriage temple is.
Though parents grudge, and you, we're met,
And cloister'd in these living walls of jet.
Though use make you apt to kill me,
Let not to that self-murder added be,
And sacrilege, three sins in killing three.

Cruel and sudden, hast thou since
Purpled thy nail in blood of innocence?
Wherein could this flea guilty be,
Except in that drop which it suck'd from thee?
Yet thou triumph'st, and say'st that thou
Find'st not thyself nor me the weaker now.
'Tis true ; then learn how false fears be ;
Just so much honour, when thou yield'st to me,
Will waste, as this flea's death took life from thee.

Andrew Marvell

The English poet and politician Andrew Marvell (1621-1678), one of the writers of the 17th century most admired by the 20th, composed lyric poetry which is sensuous, witty, elegant, and sometimes passionate.