Product Description
Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions - Together with Death's Duel is presented here in a high quality paperback edition. This popular classic work by John Donne is in the English language. If you enjoy the works of John Donne then we highly recommend this publication for your book collection. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Reflections on illness
First published in 1624, this series of meditations on illness were published following John Donne's sickness during late November and early December of 1623 (when he either had typhus or relapsing fever).Each of his ruminations are recorded in groups of three:meditation, expostulation, and prayer.Donne's insights about the "variable, therefore miserable condition of man" will always be pertinent as long as humans continue to fall prey to disease.The reading is a little slow at times, but there are some fine pieces in this book, including his famous meditation XVII, "No man is an island", that Hemingway quoted when he wrote FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS.Even if you don't read all of the essays, this book is worth obtaining just to pore over meditation XVII. ... Read more

Product Description
Born in 1572 in London England, John Donne was an English Jacobean poet of exceptional skill, whose poetry was known for its vibrancy of language and inventiveness of metaphor. While Donne was well educated and his poetic talents considerable he struggled for much of his life to provide for his family. Having published only two volumes during his lifetime, he was not a professional poet. Despite this his legacy on the world of poetry is a significant one. In this volume you will find a complete collection of John Donne's poetical works. ... Read more

Product Description
The Everyman's Library Pocket Poets hardcover series is popular for its compact size and reasonable price which does not compromise content. Poems: Donne contains Songs and Sonnets, Letters to the Countess of Bedford, The First Anniversary, Holy Sonnets, Divine Poems, excerpts from Paradoxes and Problems, Ignatius His Conclave, The Sermons, Essays and Devotions, and an index of first lines. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

A Fabulous Collection
This is a wonderful collection of Donne's poetry. It's excellent for any reader, experienced and first-timers alike. Even with no previous exposure to Donne, this collection offers extensive introductions and footnotes for all of collections contained in this book. And for more experienced Donne readers, this collection really is complete. Excellent for collectors, students, readers, and newcomers.

Wonderful for fans of the 17th century, or for those new to the era
I find John Donne's poetry distinctly representative of the 17th century. It oscilates from being passionately sexual to passionately spiritual, and every detail seems to have been considered. The poems are augmented by Donne's allusions, but they are still beautiful to read without pondering the deeper meanings.

I prefer the alphabetized format of this collection, since chronology and subject matter are fairly nebulous when it comes to Donne. The endnotes are brief enough for readers looking for something simple, but add enough interest that those with a more scholarly bent will have plenty to play with.

A great book
I am greatly enjoying this book. The notes at the end explain some of Donne's more obscure imagery. A potentially controversial choice by the editor was to change the spelling of many words to more modern forms, which makes the poems easier to read at the expense of authenticity. Some people will like that and some people won't.Another odd choice was to list the poems in alphabetical order, instead of grouping them by subject matter or attemp to list them in approxiamte chronolgical order.
Buy this book and enjoy the breathtaking poems. You could do a lot worse with your time.

Enjoying poetry that sounds good when read out loud
Finally, I've found a poet I really like reading. Donne's poems suit me more than Shakespeare's sonnets or Poe's verse, and apart from someone like Yvor Winters, I just don't get modern poetry (apologies to Sylvia Plath fans).

What rings well with me is, well, ringing well! Reading a poem out loud with a bit of drama should just sound good. That's why rap and hip hop can really be considered poetry (well, some rap and hiphop anyway).

A great example of this is Shakespeare's sonnet 129 (The expense of spirit in a waste of shame/Is lust in action; and till action, lust...). Most (not all) of Shakespeare's sonnets are harder to understand than this one, which is why they don't resonate with me as well as I'd like. Donne on the other hand is different; most of what he writes in English sounds good and is immediately understandable.

Not that I understand everything in these poems, there are many contemporary allusions that are lost on me, but there's enough in there that sounds very good to allow me to right away enjoy myself. Here are two great lines, which open the sonnet "Community", to illustrate what I mean by good sound.

Good we must love, and must hate ill,
For ill is ill, and good good still...

There are problems, themselves interesting, that bring discord to a poem. For instance in Donne's England "love" rhymed with "prove" but because today these words don't, a couplet with this rhyme is marred to our 21st century ears.

A personal note: I was in bed reading "Soul Made Flesh" about the discovery that the brain is the seat of consciousness, made by Oxford scholars in 17th century England. I had reached an account of how large audiences of curious onlookers gathered to see doctors perform autopsies. I put the book down and decided to dip into Donne before going to sleep. I flipped out when I read The Damp's opening lines:

When I am dead, and doctors know not why,
And my friends' curiosity
Will have me cut up to survey each part...

Talk about serendipity! Now if I had just read an explanation of these lines in the notes, they would not have meant much to me. But because reading "Soul Made Flesh" had transported me into Donne's England for a few moments, the dramatic effect of the opening was multiplied immensely.

In a nutshell, I find that I love Donne and I recommend this comprehensive easy-to-carry well-annotated edition. My only negative comment is that the editing is a bit unimaginative: the editor places the sonnets in alphabetical order of title simply because there is no accepted canonical ordering... Oh well.

Vincent Poirier, Tokyo

To yoke unlike things together for most passionate poetry
Songs and Sonnets, Epigrams, Elegies, Satyres, Letters, The Anniversaries, Divine Poems. These are some of the categories of this collection of Donne's complete works. The volume also has a short life of Donne, and an overall introduction to his poetry.
Donne, is generally considered the greatest of the Metaphysical poets. His two great subjects are Love and Death, and his passionate intellect dares to connect elements of diverse worlds into a rich metaphorical texture of poetic conceits. The bold comparisons , the bringing of all modes of experience into relation with the Divine mark out his truly great work.
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Product Description
"Elegantly written, psychologically andhistorically astute."—Los Angeles Times Book ReviewFrom scholar to buccaneer, from outcast toestablishment figure, John Donne emerged as oneof the greatest English poets. Following Donnefrom Plague-ridden streets to palaces, fromtaverns to the pulpit of St Paul's, JohnStubbs's "exemplary literarybiography" (Harold Bloom) is a vividportrait of an extraordinary writer and hiscountry at a time of bewildering and crueltransformation. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (14)

An Excellent Biography by an Exciting Young Scholar
John Stubbs' biography of John Donne won several high-profile international awards, and was heaped with praise by such renowned scholars as Peter Ackroyd and Harold Bloom.Deservedly so.Stubbs' biography is bright with detail, humor, and fascinating side stories that illuminate not just Donne but his world.This is as much a biography of Donne's time, as it is of the man himself.The few negative reviews of this book were written by rival scholars, including quite inexplicably by Stubbs' own doctoral supervisor, who clearly felt unmanned by Stubbs' brilliance and critical acclaim.In short, believe the praise and, if Donne and his world interest you, dive into this astonishing book.

`No man is an island entire of itself.'
In this biography, John Stubbs divides the life of John Donne (1572-1631) into three separate stages.During the first, he grows up (sows those famous wild oats) and then marries.During the second, he tries to obtain secular preferment.Finally, pushed by his friends, patrons and also by King James I, he takes holy orders, finds a religious vocation and becomes Dean of St Paul's.

This biography provides details of the historical setting in which he lived, and of the religious politics which he - with his deep Roman Catholic roots - was never entirely free of.His mother was the great-niece of Sir Thomas More; his brother died as a result of harbouring a priest who was himself executed.At the time of his marriage, John Donne was Chief Secretary to the Lord Keeper of the Great Seal (Sir Thomas Egerton) and quite probably well placed for secular preferment. Alas, his secret marriage to Ann More, niece of Sir Thomas, ruined his career and earned him a brief period in prison.

But what of John Donne the man?It is tempting to read his early poems, as John Stubbs does, as reflecting the man himself.It makes Donne an even more romantic - and tragic - figure: torn at times between desire and spiritual devotion.Ann died five days after giving birth to their 12th child (10 of whom survived), after sixteen years of marriage. Donne never remarried.

I found this biography very interesting and while I am cautious about the boundary between fact and interpretation, I learned a lot about the life and times of John Donne.And, knowing a little more about the man I feel moved to read more of his poetry.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Awful
Sometimes an academic will pick a subject to write about just to prove themselves scholistically. In such cases you can expect the subject matter to suffer, but in some cases it suffers worse then others.
After reading a fairly large portion of this book, I was still left wondering who Donne really was, considering that the majority of what I was reading seemed to be interpreted through the authors personal opinons. The same goes for the characters around him.

I think I could have learned more in a book that simply contained the facts and Donnes writings and gone from there.

Finally gave up in disgust.

I really don't like the practice of a writer choosing a famous name in history to give a running critique of for a 'viewers interest' in a barely disguised attempt to make themselves look good. It's irritating. You can write an honest and effective biography without it.

A boring portrait of a fascinating person
I found this book to be a huge disappointment. Not only were there numerous solecisms which were distracting to the whole (he could have used a real editor over at Norton), but it was ponderous, emotionless, and just plain dull. John Donnne was anything but dull--but this portrait was an arduous read. I could not wait to finish it. It seemed very amateurish and even dissertationlal: repeating the same thesis over and over like a bludgeon. That's okay to prepare for a defense, but that technique should have been smoothed out by a decent editor.

A key acquisition for any college-level library including studies of past poets
John Donne emerged as one of the world's greatest English poets from his former status as a buccaneer, capturing the paradoxes of his times and offering satirical visions of hell, powerful meditations in verse, and more. His psychological state and literary impact are explored in a striking biography merging social and literary insights: a key acquisition for any college-level library including studies of past poets.
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Product Description
“Donald Dickson's John Donne's Poetry is thebest text of Donne now available. It isscrupulously edited, and equally useful forstudents and for scholars.”—Harold Bloom, YaleUniversityThe texts reprinted in this newNorton Critical Edition have been scrupulouslyedited and are from the Westmoreland manuscriptwhere possible, collated against the mostimportant families of Donne manuscripts—theCambridge Belam, the Dublin Trinity, and theO’Flahertie—and compared with all sevenseventeenth-century printed editions of thepoems as well as all major twentieth-centuryeditions.“Criticism” is divided into foursections and represents the best criticism andinterpretation of Donne’s writing: “Donne andMetaphysical Poetry” includes sevenseventeenth-century views by contemporaries ofDonne such as Ben Jonson, Thomas Carew, and John Dryden, among others; “Satires, Elegies, andVerse Letters” includes seven selections thatoffer social and literary context for andinsights into Donne’s frequently overlookedearly poems; “Songs and Sonnets” features sixanalyses of Donne’s love poetry; and “HolySonnets/Divine Poems” explores Donne’s struggles as a Christian through four authoritativeessays.A Chronology of Donne’s life and work,a Selected Bibliography, and an Index of Titlesand First Lines are also included. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

A Reading of "Farewel, ye guilded follies"
Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/R1AJGKYT5YW1O0 I have left all explication for the video, save to say that "Farewel" above is Donne's original orthography.

Poor Editing or Poor Editorial Choices
"Donald Dickson's John Donne's Poetry is the best text of Donne now available. It is scrupulously edited, and equally useful for students and for scholars." --Harold Bloom

Harold Bloom is wrong. Period.

If you, as a reader, value Donne's own editorial punctuation - his indications as to how the meter of the poem should be read - don't buy this book. Dickson is inconsistent. He notes some of Donne's indications while he ignores others. What's worse, he gives the reader no indication that he is doing so. I strongly recommend Patride's edition of Donne's Complete English Poems. For a clear discussion of this, feel free to check out my post on "Batter my Heart" at my blog "PoemShape".

You will also find a link to Patride's edition (also at Amazon).

METAPHYSICAN HEAL THYSELF, PLEASE
Since my youth I have admired the poetry of John Donne. Not for its overwhelmingly religious and theological sentiments but for its individuality.One can take a subject that he was writing on in one poem, say mortalism, and see it interpreted in another way in another poem dedicated to another patron. It was only later that I found out that my intuition about what amounts to the theological opportunism of the Rev. Mr. Donne was more than a literary devise. He was desperately trying to keep his head above water in the on-going theological struggles that held England in their grip for most of the 17th century. I am much more of a philosophical materialist now than I was in my youth however these metaphysical poems still mean something to me. The `deathless' "Death Be Not Proud" is still one of my favorite poems in the English language.

Among the most profound and moving in the language
This selection of the most important of Donne's poems complemented by critical articles that provide insight into the techniques and meanings of one of the most intellectually challenging of the great English poets is first -rate.
Donne's greatness asa poet is in part in his making passionate argument of ideas, in his fusing the world of sense and idea in startling combinations. His poems of Love and of Death are among the most profound and moving in the language.

A Book So Good It Almost Deserves Canonization... Laaaaaame pun.
***I've noticed that a second edition of Donne's poetry has been released and amazon has just been forwarding the reviews from the first.This review was written for the first edition.

When I made the decision that I wanted to study John Donne this book was the first place I turned.Norton Critical Editions tend to be the most thorough studies of any particular writing with generous helpings of criticism and well annotated authoritative texts and this one is no different.

The criticism in particular is phenomenal.They are especially brilliant when reconciling the difficult contradictions between what can appear as base as lust in Donne's love poetry and the higher love that Donne aspires to.The essays dealing with the various categorizing and readings of Donne's religious poetry are also invaluable.Most every piece of criticism included in this edition helps to illuminate Donne's works and aid new readers attempting to grasp the various levels of activity going on in much of his poetry.

I only refrain from giving this edition a full five stars because it lacks any sort of cohesive introduction to Donne's life.The poetry of John Donne in particular reflects the man's life and without any sort of background information, even a few pages in an introduction, readers are essentially just cast adrift.However, this information is easily obtained online or at the library.

Regardless, this still remains the best edition of Donne available both as an introduction for beginners and for those who wish to have a better grasp on Donne's work.If you are at all interested in John Donne, this book is absolutely necessary! ... Read more

Product Description
In addition to the writer's 1624 collection of meditations, debates with God, and prayers on the human condition-particularly earthly physical sickness and health-this volume contains the 1631 work "Death's Duel," a sermon said to be his own funeral oration, which he preached shortly before his own death. Readers of 17th-century literature, religious devotionals, and ponderers of human mortality are sure to find something profound in this fascinating, famous work.British metaphysical poet JOHN DONNE (1572-1631), renowned for his satires on English society, wrote this prose work in the latter part of his life, after he became an Anglican priest.Amazon.com Review
Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions and Death's Duel, one of the handsome series of Vintage Spiritual Classics, contains a rich collection of extraordinary writings, any one of which would be worth the price of the whole book. Andrew Motion's clear, accessible, entertaining, and erudite introduction explains the situation of both Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions--written in 1624, when Donne was feeble with a fever that doctors believed might kill him--and Death's Duel--Donne's final sermon at St. Paul's Cathedral, preached only a month before his death at age 59. Also included is Izaak Walton's The Life of Dr. John Donne, a spry and penetrating biography of the poet, written in 1640. And then there is the meat: both Devotions and Death's Duel show Donne at his very best--theatrical, humble, faithful, and doubting all at once. This is a book of severe and joyful mortality. Here is a foretaste from Devotions: "Death is in an old man's door, he appears and tells him so, and death is at a young man's back, and says nothing.... There is scarce anything that hath not killed somebody; a hair, a feather hath done it; nay, that which is our best antidote against it hath done it; the best cordial hath been deadly poison." --Michael Joseph Gross ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Style Works With Substance
When John Donne was writing his Devotions upon Emergent Occasions, he was convinced that he was near death.For most of his early life, he led a life that he would later come to see as profligate and dissolute.After he was appointed as Dean of St. Paul's Parish, he slowly changed into a zealous believer in God, the Bible, and the afterlife.His parishioners and reading audience well knew of his early lifestyle and could see that his metamorphosis was genuine.When he grew ill in 1623, they could relate to the inner turmoil that they knew he felt as he lay in bed contemplating the excesses of his past life and the uncertain future of the next.But there was far more to the bare facts of his infirmity.His meditations, which were never intended for publication, have held readers spellbound for centuries due to the rhetorical flourishes of prose that ironically bring to mind the very libertine poems that he wrote as a call to celebrate the joys of a carnal-based love.His meditations, despite their seeming fragmentary nature, are resonant with dramatic immediacy, memorable phrasing, driving rhythms, compelling figurative language, and an unexpected level of emotional passion mixed with a more traditional amount of acceptance of the inevitable.

Just as Donne has the ability to enthrall the reader in his early light verse, so does he in his later serious prose.His initial meditation directly and immediately involves the reader with his doleful lamentation of personal illness.Donne uses a combination of metaphor and parallelism as he writes, "But in a minute, a cannon batters all, overthrows all, demolishes all."This "cannon" is a symbol of heavenly displeasure of Donne's self-professed sins.Donne also has a talent for choosing the apt phrase.His use of paradox as in "we beggared ourselves by hearkening after false riches," forces the reader to connect the unreality of earthly riches with the poverty that results when those riches are achieved.Further in Meditation I, his mention of "we die and cannot enjoy death," emphasizes the duality of death in that death is legitimately to be feared but to those who have led sinful lives, death cannot bring an end to worldly pain.

In Meditations IV and XII, Donne makes frequent and forceful use of micro and macro imagery, the result of which is to take humanity and "blow" it up into a gargantuan state that emphatically connects his belief of man as a creature of free will to having to accept responsibility for the acting out of that will. When he writes that "It is too little to call a man a little world," he suggests that man's bodies and thoughts, now impossibly enlarged, are titanic enough to house and radiate ideas that can traverse the universe all the while implying by ironic contrast the present immobility of his bedridden form.

Donne is also a master of personification, the ability to portray non-human entities as possessing human traits. As he attempts to emphasize his contention that all of humanity is linked in such a way that what one link feels or experiences has some measurable effect on the others, Donne pictures a kindly nature that is intimately involved in human affairs.He describes in Meditation XVII, a nature that can baptize a child, and at the same time can connect that baptism to him personally.He pictures that child as becoming connected to a body of Christian believers as analogous to that child's being "engrafted into that body whereof I am a member."In the same meditation, he writes what has since become one of the most widely quoted sentences in English. "Never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."In these few words, Donne punctuates his thesis that all the separate parts of humanity are linked in ways that transcend the physical.

It is one of the ironies of Donne's conversion from the libertine "Jack" Donne of his early verse to the mature "John" Donne of the meditations that the very qualities of rhetoric that pleased the former are still used by the latter to set out a moral view of the universe that filled him with an overpowering sense of dread.That we today can feel this dread in each meditation is a marker of a man obsessed with past sins but unable to find a way to live with them.

That action concerns me
I must admit that I bought this book solely for the most famous of Donne's Meditations - Nunc lento sonitu dicunt, morieris, AKA "no man is an island".I was unaware of the circumstances which surrounded Donne's writing of the Meditations.He had taken ill with a strong and high fever, and believed that he was dying.The meditations trace his spiritual journey through his illness, starting with the beginning (The first alteration, the first grudging, or the sickness), through attempts to treat him (The physician is sent for), to treatments (They apply pigeons, to draw the vapors from the head - yuck!), until he comes to terms spiritually with his fate (From the bells of the church adjoining, I am daily remembered of my burial in the funerals of others).

These meditations make a fascinating contrast with the other work by Donne in this book: Death's Duel.This was the last sermon that Donne ever preached, one month before he died.Not only did he know that the end was near, but so did his audience, who called it "the doctor's funeral sermon".It is interesting to see how Donne's view of death had changed in the years between the two works.By the time Death's Duel was written, Donne's mother, wife, and six of his twelve children were already dead.

In spite of the fact that Donne wrote over three hundred years ago, I am still influenced by his writings.Although I am not Christian, I agree with many of Donne's thoughts on how people interact with each other, and how we effect the lives of others, though we might not realise it."Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind."Donne, though dead, is still involved in mankind, and this book aptly displays it.

what gives me the write to title this thing when a title....
for this book,devotions upon emergent occasions and deaths duel has already been so good. Wow! what more can i possibly say....alot.firstly, fascinating stuff. it was really great and jesus Christ we love him, John Donne? WOW?!! what do you think? read it really it is very nicely proportionate for me the dimensions where spectacular and also a very nice size, John Donne? Where in the world is John Donne when we need him now....bye John Donne? ... Read more

Product Description
John Donne (1572-1631) is perhaps the most important poet of the seventeenth century, and has often been referred to as the founder of the metaphysical genre. His poetry is highly distinctive and individual, adopting a multitude of tones, images, forms, and personae. This collection of Donne's verse includes a wide selection from both his secular and divine poems, including such well-known poems as "Air and Angels," "The Flea," the "Holy Sonnets", and "The Progress of the Soul." The poems are provided with full Notes and a useful Introduction to Donne's life and poetry. ... Read more

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Lives of John Donne, Henry Wotton, Rich'd Hooker, George Herbert, &C, Volume 2 is presented here in a high quality paperback edition. This popular classic work by Izaak Walton is in the English language. If you enjoy the works of Izaak Walton then we highly recommend this publication for your book collection. ... Read more

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Rich selection of 73 works from the Songs and Sonnets, Elegies, Holy Sonnets and other verse forms by foremost English "metaphysical" poet. Included are "The Good Morrow," "The Canonization," "The Relic," "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning," "To His Mistress Going to Bed," "Death Be Not Proud," "Good Friday, 1613. Riding Westward," "Hymn to God My God, in My Sickness" and many more. Note. Alphabetical lists of titles and first lines.
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Customer Reviews (2)

Very Affordable Sample of Donne's Best Poetry
John Donne wrote some of the most beautiful and amazing poetry in the English language!I highly recommend his poetry to students of poetry and English literature.The language is old, but that's also some of its beauty and charm.Some of his images are striking and truly make you think and feel.

While this Dover Thrift Edition of Donne's "Selected Poems" has a limited selection of Donne's poetry, it contains some of his best poetry.Any collection, even a limited one, should include his "Holy Sonnets," and I'm glad to say that these are found here, including the attention-grabbing "Batter My Heart, Three-Personed God."

If you're looking for an introduction to Donne's poetry, this is a great place to start.What I like best about the Dover Thrift Editions in general, this price included, is that they are the most affordable new books out there!If you learn to love Donne's poetry, as I have, there are plenty of editions of his complete poems available as well.

It's a classic
This is a collection of some of the best poems written by Donne...ifyou can appreciate poetry and are willing understand then you enjoythis. ... Read more

Product Description
The glory of John Donne's prose at its best is very different from that of his verse, but is equal to it; and there can be no question that his best prose is in his sermons. His sense of form and arrangement, his psychological insight, his differences of mood and emphasis, and his religious fervor will make this selection of ten sermons particularly interesting to the attentive reader familiar with Donne's poetry. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

An Unforgettable Spiritual Classic!
John Donne's poetic words pierce the heart and ignite the imagination.He speaks food for the soul, not just the heart.I have read and re-read his books for many years and cannot tell how deeply they have moved me and inspired me to be a better Christian.He was a profound writer, almost mystical and yet so very down to earth.A beautiful book that should not be missed by anyone interested in the life of faith. ... Read more

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John Donne (1572-1631) is a poet of concerted emotional and intellectual force, whose strenuously original approach to the subject matter, diction and form of verse re-made English poetry. Donne's poetry combines paradoxical wit, scientific and theological learning with the rhythms and diction of spoken language. Crises of love, conscience, and faith are the great concerns of his poetry which is by turns exalted or disenchanted, direct or oblique, morally profound or outrageously spiteful. ... Read more

Product Description
John Donne (1572-1631) is perhaps the most important poet of the seventeenth century, and has often been referred to as the founder of the metaphysical genre. His poetry is highly distinctive and individual, adopting a multitude of tones, images, forms, and personae. This collection of Donne's verse includes a wide selection from both his secular and divine poems, including such well-known poems as "Air and Angels," "The Flea," the "Holy Sonnets", and "The Progress of the Soul." The poems are provided with full Notes and a useful Introduction to Donne's life and poetry.Amazon.com Review
John Donne's love poetry is a magnetic mix of the soulsinging, intellectual rigor, and the lascivious prod. Seductionsabound, but go hand in hand with metaphors of science, discovery, andconquest: "License my roving hands, and let them go, / Behind,before, above, between, below. / O my America! my new-found-land, / Mykingdom, safeliest when with one man manned ..." In "TheFlea," the speaker even uses a revolting parasite to persuade hisyoung woman to bed. Since the flea has bitten both of them already, heurges, why should they not commingle on a larger scale? But in one ofDonne's trademark reversals, the argument fails when the womansquashes the offending insect.

"The Good Morrow" is a good deal more romantic, opening:"I wonder by my troth, what thou and I / Did, till weloved?" Lines such as "And now good morrow to our wakingsouls, / Which watch not one another out of fear; / For love all loveof other sights controls, / And makes one little room aneverywhere" have even made the poem a weddingstandard. ("The Sun Rising" is another nuptial favorite.) Asusual, however, the poet adds a tincture of imperfection to thevision: the persona's excuse (charming but dubious), "If ever anybeauty I did see, / Which I desired, and got, 'twas but a dream ofthee." Though readers might concentrate on the love songs andsonnets, John Carey's edition of the Selected Poetry offersmuch more, including satires, epigrams, and Donne's brilliant holysonnets. As rugged, brilliantly contorted, and fraught with feeling ashis more diurnal poetry, they are also equally concerned withinconstancy--Donne was born a Catholic, but converted to Anglicanismin 1593. "Batter my heart, three-personed God" ends:"Take me to You, imprison me, for I / Except You' enthrall me,never shall be free, / Nor ever chaste, except You ravish me." ... Read more

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A new selection spanning the breadth of Donne’s verse

One of England’s preeminent poets, John Donne’s poems are among the most passionate, profound, and spiritual in the English language. This rich representation reflects the wide diversity of his poetry. From such witty items as "The Flea," which transforms the image of a louse into something marvelous, to the intimate and intense Holy Sonnets, Donne breathed new vigor into poetry by drawing lucid and often startling metaphors from the world in which he lived. ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (1)

A life long life of contemplation
Every school child is familiar with John Dunne poetry and imagery drenched sermons and other writings. At least I hope so. There is a certain charm and elegance to be absorbed.

Born into a prominent Catholic family,Dunne converted for what most report was political gain. Ultimately, he held the prestigious position of dean of St. Paul in London. His lectures, poems and other pronouncements led to notoriety and celebrity status during his lifetime.

But fame can be fleeting.Popular as his sermons and writings were, there would be periods in history when they all but disappeared. He just wasn't in vogue in the 18th century.In fact, such heavy weights asSamuel Johnson criticized his writings as "violent and unnatural."

Donne devoted much of his life to exploring and discussing the relationship between ones body and ones soul. Not only on this earthly plane but in the hereafter. That has been the touchstone for author Ramie Targoff intriguing book.

She has analyzed Dunne's literary and philosophical preoccupations and has written an unvarnished account of a literary man of the cloth drenched with earthy passions, an intense curiosity and a felicitous way with words. She struggles valiantly with all of Dunne's theories about the soul: when it enters the human body or fetus, whether is it separated at death and then later reconnected at the resurrection and on and on. All quite intriguing if a bit tedious.

Although the topic is dreary and painfully repetitive at times, this is a carefully researched book, thoughtfully written. Just don't read it on a stormy night.
*************

Dr. Mellander was a university administrator for 15 years and a college president for 20.
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Product Description
The Oxford Handbook of John Donne presents scholars with the history of Donne studies and provides tools to orient scholarship in this field in the twenty-first century and beyond. Though profoundly historical in its orientation, the Handbook is not a summary of existing knowledge but a resource that reveals patterns of literary and historical attention and the new directions that these patterns enable or obstruct.
Part I - Research resources in Donne Studies and why they matter - emphasizes the heuristic and practical orientation of the Handbook, examining prevailing assumptions and reviewing the specialized scholarly tools available. This section provides a brief evaluation and description of the scholarly strengths, shortcomings, and significance of each resource, focusing on a balanced evaluation of the opportunities and the hazards each offers.
Part II - Donne's genres - begins with an introduction that explores the significance and differentiation of the numerous genres in which Donne wrote, including discussion of the problems posed by his overlapping and bending of genres. Essays trace the conventions and histories of the genres concered and study the ways in which Donne's works confirm how and why his 'fresh invention' illustrates his responses to the literary and non-literary contexts of their composition.
Part III - Biographical and historical contexts - creates perspective on what is known about Donne's life; shows how his life and writings epitomized and affected important controversial issues of his day; and brings to bear on Donne studies some of the most stimulating and creative ideas developed in recent decades by historians of early modern England.
Part IV - Problems of literary interpretation that have been traditionally and generally important in Donne Studies - introduces students and researchers to major critical debates affecting the reception of Donne from the 17th through to the 21st centuries. ... Read more

Product Description
'Donne is perhaps the most intellectual of English poets, and John Carey is perhaps the most intelligent of contemporary English literary critics. The encounter, as one might expect, is fierce and enthralling...This book is sensitive, searching, powerful, exciting, provocative and witty. It is a superb achievement' - Christopher Hill, "TLS". "John Donne: Life, Mind and Art" is a unique attempt to see Donne whole. Beginning with an account of his life, it takes as its domain not only the whole range of the poetry, but also the sermons, the letters, the spiritual and controversial works, and such highly personal documents as the treatise on suicide.The result is a clearer picture than has hitherto emerged of one of the most intricate and compelling of literary personalities. 'The one book we have needed all along...A magnificent exercise in reappraisal. I have never read a critical work which reaches as deeply inside the mind of its subject' - Jonathan Raban, "Sunday Times". 'Carey's book is itself alive with the kind of energy it attributes to Donne' - Christopher Ricks, "London Review of Books". ... Read more