17th century in English Literature – Metaphysical poetry презентация

Lecture #5

Historical Background – Britain 1625-1702 three religious groups: The Church of England (Anglican Protestants) the official state Church as established by Henry VIII during the Reformation; a hierarchical structure governed by archbishops and bishops; a living symbol of England’s independence from Rome. The Roman Catholic Church (Catholics) a sizeable minority did not accept the Reformation and remained Catholic.

Historical Background – Britain 1625-1702 Puritans, Presbyterians and Dissenters non-conformists, started to form during the reign of Elizabeth I; believed that the Reformation had not been radical enough; elected their ministers and criticized as undemocratic the hierarchical structure of the other Churches; had very strict moral principles; the way to salvation lay in a life of hard work and avoidance of all forms of frivolous entertainment.

Politics in the 17th century England the Tudor monarchs – autocratic Charles I (1625-1649) 1629 - dissolved the Parliament, ruled for 11 years without one; 1640 – had to reopen the Parliament to ask for taxes; the Parliament refused; 1642 - the Parliament demanded the control of the army. Charles’s refusal meant Civil War;

Politics in the 17th century England Puritan army (under the command of Oliver Cromwell) vs. the king’s royalist forces; Puritan victory; Charles was executed on June 30th 1649; Cromwell and his followers founded a republic (the Commonwealth) – collapsed in 1660 after the death of Cromwell; monarchy restored (Charles II) - the Restoration.

Puritan and Restoration Poetry The Cavalier Poets defended the monarchy against the Puritans during the reign of Charles I Robert Herrick, Thomas Carew, Robert Lovelace, Sir John Suckling ideal gentleman - a lover, a soldier, a wit, a musician, a poet light-hearted approach to life poetry for births, marriages, great parties poems embodied the spirit of the upper classes before the Puritan Commonwealth

Cavalier Poetry Out upon it! I have loved Three whole days together, And am like to love three more If it prove good weather. Sir John Suckling Sir John Suckling: "Why So Pale and Wan, Fond Lover?"

Cavalier Poetry To Electra I dare not ask a kiss; I dare not beg a smile; Lest having that or this, I might grow proud the while.   No, no, the utmost share Of my desire shall be Only to kiss the air That lately kissed thee. Robert Herrick

Metaphysical Poetry George Herbert Richard Crashaw Henry Vaughan followed in the tradition of John Donne (1572-1631); misleading term “metaphysical “ used by literary critic Samuel Johnson, the 18th century; the poetry did not deal with philosophical speculation but with the themes of religion and love; Johnson used the word “metaphysical” to criticise what he considered to be the poets’ desire to be original at any cost; 18th and 19th centuries - the Metaphysical poets were unpopular; beginning of the 20th century - T.S. Eliot helped generate new appreciation for Donne and his followers

The features of Metaphysical poetry the use of conceits: comparisons between objects which at first glance seem to have nothing in common; the argumentative quality of the love poems, in which the poet tries to persuade his lover to share his point of view; the dramatic quality of the language, which often seems to be one side of a dialogue between the poet and his lover, or God, or himself; the wide range of subjects from which the poet draws his imagery (sciences, travel, medicine, alchemy, philosophy) – vs. Elizabethan poetry (which used the stock imagery of the period - birds, flowers, sun, moon, stars); the use of wit (in the 17th century - the ability to relate dissimilar ideas, implied intellectual genius - use of paradoxes, conceits, puns)

John Donne (1572-1631) born in London to a prominent Roman Catholic family; converted to Anglicanism during the 1590s; at the age of 11 entered the University of Oxford, then Cambridge – took no degree; 1592 - began the study of law at Lincoln's Inn, London; legal or diplomatic career; 1598 - appointed private secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton, Keeper of the Great Seal;

John Donne (1572-1631) 1601 - secretly married Egerton's niece, Anne More; dismissed from his position, brief imprisonment; made a meagre living as a lawyer; Divine Poems (1607); 1615 - became a priest of the Anglican Church, appointed royal chaplain; 1621 - named dean of St. Paul's Cathedral; attained eminence as a preacher, delivered the most brilliant and eloquent sermons of his time.

John Donne (1572-1631) a wide range of secular and religious subjects: cynical verse about inconstancy, poems about true love, Neoplatonic lyrics on the mystical union of lovers' souls and bodies, brilliant satires and hymns depicting his own spiritual struggles

John Donne (1572-1631) Characteristics of Donne’s poetry (typified the work of the metaphysical poets): dazzling wordplay, often explicitly sexual; paradox; subtle argumentation; surprising contrasts; intricate psychological analysis; striking imagery selected from nontraditional areas (law, physiology, scholastic philosophy, mathematics)

John Donne (1572-1631) Prose: The Sermons (160) imaginative explications of biblical passages; intense explorations of the themes of divine love and of the decay and resurrection of the body; Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions (1624)

Some works by John Donne Poetry Satires (1593) Songs and Sonnets (1601) Divine Poems (1607) An Anatomy of the World (1611) The Second Anniversary. Of The Progress of the Soul (1611) An Anatomy of the World (1612) Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions (1624) Wisdom crying out to Sinners (1639)   Essays Three Sermons Upon Special Occasions (1623) The First Sermon Preached To King Charles (1625) Essays in Divinity (1651)

A VALEDICTION FORBIDDING MOURNING As virtuous men pass mildly away, And whisper to their souls to go, Whilst some of their sad friends do say, "The breath goes now," and some say, "No,"   So let us melt, and make no noise, No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move; 'Twere profanation of our joys To tell the laity our love.   Moving of the earth brings harms and fears, Men reckon what it did and meant; But trepidation of the spheres, Though greater far, is innocent.   Dull sublunary lovers' love (Whose soul is sense) cannot admit Absence, because it doth remove Those things which elemented it.   But we, by a love so much refined That our selves know not what it is, Inter-assured of the mind, Care less, eyes, lips, and hands to miss.

ПРОЩАНИЕ, ВОЗБРАНЯЮЩЕЕ ПЕЧАЛЬ Как шепчет праведник: пора! - Своей душе, прощаясь тихо, Пока царит вокруг одра Печальная неразбериха,   Вот так безропотно сейчас Простимся в тишине - пора нам! Кощунством было б напоказ Святыню выставлять профанам.   Страшат толпу толчки земли, О них толкуют суеверы, Но скрыто от людей вдали Дрожание небесной сферы.   Любовь подлунную томит Разлука бременем несносным: Ведь цель влеченья состоит В том, что потребно чувствам косным.   Перевод Г. М. Кружкова

Poetic devices ballad-like four-line stanzas help create the gently, slowly moving "feel" of the poem; rhyme scheme - consistent and predictable; emotion confined to the “laity"-the ordinary lovers who cannot stand parting. Conceits used: Donne and wife > celestial bodies > the points of a compass; the wedding ring > the path of a planet > the alchemical symbol for gold > the path traced out by a compass; the emotions of the common people > earthquakes and tempests

Imagery / References to Donne's learning The circle Marriage ring Path of the planets (Trepidation of the spheres) Alchemical symbol for gold was a circle with a point in the centre Path described by a compass. Very broad range of knowledge displayed: planetary trepidation earthquakes, the love of "sublunary lovers" properties of gold – malleable, the most precious of all the metals, the least reactive of all metals, the most noble metal, the most difficult to destroy compass imagery and use

Religious themes in Donne’s woks Devotions upon Emergent Occasions (1624) series of reflections written as Donne recovered from a serious illness (typhus or relapsing fever); describes this as a "preternatural birth, in returning to life, from this sickness"; consists of twenty-three parts ('devotions') describing each stage of the sickness; each part is further divided into a Meditation, an Expostulation, and a Prayer.

MEDITATION XVII. NUNC LENTO SONITU DICUNT, MORIERIS. Now this bell tolling softly for another, says to me, Thou must die. ... all mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated; God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God's hand is in every translation, and his hand shall bind up all our scattered leaves again, for that library where every book shall lie open to one another; as therefore the bell that rings to a sermon, calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come; so this bell calls us all: but how much more me, who am brought so near the door by this sickness. No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less... any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

TO HIS MISTRESS GOING TO BED COME, madam, come, all rest my powers defy ; Until I labour, I in labour lie. The foe ofttimes, having the foe in sight, Is tired with standing, though he never fight. Off with that girdle, like heaven's zone glittering, But a far fairer world encompassing. Unpin that spangled breast-plate, which you wear, That th' eyes of busy fools may be stopp'd there. Unlace yourself, for that harmonious chime Tells me from you that now it is bed-time. Off with that happy busk, which I envy, That still can be, and still can stand so nigh. Your gown going off such beauteous state reveals, As when from flowery meads th' hill's shadow steals. Off with your wiry coronet, and show The hairy diadems which on you do grow. Off with your hose and shoes ; then softly tread In this love's hallow'd temple, this soft bed. In such white robes heaven's angels used to be Revealed to men ; thou, angel, bring'st with thee A heaven-like Mahomet's paradise ; and though Ill spirits walk in white, we easily know By this these angels from an evil sprite ; Those set our hairs, but these our flesh upright.

В ПОСТЕЛЬ Ко мне, сударыня! Я замер, я притих, Как в ожиданье схваток родовых. Так вид врага порой столь нестерпим, Что можно пасть, и не сразившись с ним. Прочь пояс - он блестит, как край небес, Но обнимает мир иных чудес. И эту брошь с груди сними скорей - Глупцам пристало любоваться ей. Рви пальцами шнуровку - слышишь звон? - Час наступил - для нас назначен он. Прочь этот лиф - завидовать готов Его спокойствию вблизи таких даров. Слетает платье, стан полуоткрыв, Как будто тень сошла с цветущих нив. Сними венец - какой теперь в нем прок? - И покажи волос своих венок. Прочь туфельки, ступай же в тишине В священный храм любви - в постель ко мне. Так в белом одеянье с высоты Нисходят ангелы. Мой ангел - это ты, Даруешь мне блаженств восточный рай. А ты, душа, злых духов отличай От ангелов - различье таково: Там волосы встают, здесь - естество. Не связывай мне руки и утешь - Пусти их спереди и сзади, вниз и меж.

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee  Death, be not proud, though some have called thee  Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;  For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow  Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.  From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,  Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,  And soonest our best men with thee do go,  Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.  Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,  And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,  And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well  And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?  One short sleep past, we wake eternally  And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die. 

John Milton (1608-1674) born in London on December 9, 1608, into a middle-class family; prepared to enter the clergy; after university (Christ's College, Cambridge), abandoned plans to join the priesthood; course of independent study to prepare for a career as a poet (classical and modern works of religion, science, philosophy, history, politics, and literature); proficient in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, French, Spanish, Italian, familiar with Old English and Dutch May 1638 - began a 13-month tour of France and Italy, met many important intellectuals and influential people, including the astronomer Galileo

John Milton (1608-1674) during the English Civil War championed the cause of the Puritans and Oliver Cromwell; wrote a series of pamphlets advocating radical political topics (the morality of divorce, the freedom of the press, populism, and sanctioned regicide) served as secretary for foreign languages in Cromwell's government, composing official statements defending the Commonwealth; steadily lost his eyesight, and was completely blind by 1651; after the Restoration of Charles II to the throne in 1660, arrested as a defender of the Commonwealth, fined, and soon released

John Milton (1608-1674) lived the rest of his life in seclusion in the country; completed the blank-verse epic poem Paradise Lost (1667); sequel Paradise Regained (1671); tragedy Samson Agonistes (1671); oversaw the printing of a second edition of Paradise Lost in 1674; included an explanation of "why the poem rhymes not," clarifying his use of blank verse; died on November 8, 1674, in Buckinghamshire, England.

John Milton (1608-1674) A Selected Bibliography Poetry Lycidas (1638) Poems (1645) Paradise Lost (1667) Paradise Regained (1671) Samson Agonistes (1671)

Paradise Lost chronicles Satan's temptation of Adam and Eve and their expulsion from Eden; masterpiece and one of the greatest epic poems in world literature; debate regarding its theological themes, political commentary, and its depiction of the fallen angel Satan who is often viewed as the protagonist of the work.

Paradise Lost In choosing between Latin and English for the language of the poem, Milton compromised by inventing a new dialect for poetry, one that is removed from the language of natural speech. How could this rebel Puritan not have a degree of sympathy for the arch-rebel Satan? How could a scholar such as Milton believe that the tree of knowledge should be forbidden to mankind?

Paradise Lost – Book 1 Farewell, happy fields, Where joy for ever dwells! Hail, horrors! hail, Infernal world! and thou, profoundest Hell, Receive thy new possessor--one who brings A mind not to be changed by place or time. The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven. What matter where, if I be still the same, And what I should be, all but less than he Whom thunder hath made greater? Here at least We shall be free; th' Almighty hath not built Here for his envy, will not drive us hence: Here we may reign secure; and, in my choice, To reign is worth ambition, though in Hell: Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.