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The Flea
By John Donne
Metaphysical Poetry-
Definition(1)
By itself, metaphysical means dealing with the
relationship between spirit to matter or the ultimate
nature of reality. The Metaphysical poets are
obviously not the only poets to deal with this subject
matter, so there are a number of other qualities
involved as well:
Use of ordinary speech mixed with puns,
paradoxes and conceits (a paradoxical metaphor
causing a shock to the reader by the strangeness of
the objects compared; some examples: lovers and a
compass, the soul and timber, the body and mind)
Metaphysical Poetry-
Definition (2)
The exaltation of wit, which in the 17th century meant a
nimbleness of thought; a sense of fancy (imagination of a
fantastic or whimsical nature); and originality in figures of speech
Abstruse terminology often drawn from science or law
Often poems are presented in the form of an argument
In love poetry, the metaphysical poets often draw on ideas from
Renaissance Neo-Platonism to show the relationship between
the soul and body and the union of lovers' souls
They also try to show a psychological realism when describing
the tensions of love.
Metaphysical Poetry
Platonic Love(1)
During the Renaissance, Plato got mingled with Christian and
Eastern thought. Through this mingling we get Platonic love
(which is a lot more than you probably think it means). For Plato,
beauty proceeds in a series of steps from the love of one
beautiful body to that of two, to the love of physical beauty in
general, and ultimately to the love of that beauty "not in the
likeness of a face or hands or in the forms of speech or
knowledge or animal or particular thing in time or place, but
beauty absolute, separate, simple, everlasting--the source and
cause of all that perishing beauty of all other things."
When this scheme is Christianized by equating this ultimate
beauty with the Divine Beauty of God, the Renaissance Platonic
lover can move in stages through the desire for his mistress,
whose beauty he recognizes as an emanation of God's, to the
worship of the Divine itself.
Metaphysical Poetry-
Platonic Love(2)
This complex doctrine of love which embraces
sexuality (the mystical union of souls, cf. Donne's
"The Canonization") but which is directed to an ideal
end (discussed in Plato's Symposium) is particularly
evident in Donne. (But we see it in poets from
Sidney to Lawrence).
Platonic love has also come to mean a love
between individuals which transcends sexual desire
and attains spiritual heights (for examples, see
some of the courtly romances like Tennyson's Idylls
of the King), as well as homosexual love (see
Forster's Maurice), derived from the praise of
homosexual love in The Symposium.
The Flea
By John Donne
John Donne- Biography
- Explanation and
Analysis(1)
This poem was written by a woman named
in Dynasty. She wrote this poem in order to stop
her husband from marrying a concubine.
The first two sentences, the writer describes how
deep they love each other and what a great passion
between them. is a pronoun. It represent You
or I , thus, means I am you and you
are me. We love each other very much so that we
do not have to distinguish who we are, because we
are together, our hearts and minds unitize together.
- Explanation and
Analysis(2)
She compares their passionate love to fire. She
uses fire to create a vivid image. Then, the writer
uses soil to give a more vivid image to confirm their
everlasting love. From the third sentence, use soil to
knead a you and knead an I. Then, break us up
together and mix up with water. Re kneads a you
and re kneads an I. In this way, I have you and you
could have me. In the last sentence, the writer
confirms their permanent love that no matter live or
die, they will be together for all eternity.
- The Song
THE MUSIC!
Metaphysical Poetry
http://www.eng.fju.edu.tw/English_Literature/pe
riod/metaphysicals.html
John Donne
http://www.online-literature.com/donne/
Thank You for Your
Participation!