Compare and contrast ‘To His Coy Mistress’ by Andrew Marvell with ‘The Sun Rising’ by John Donne

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Compare and contrast ‘To His Coy Mistress’ by Andrew Marvell with ‘The Sun Rising’ by John Donne

Both poems that I am studying were both written in the era of metaphysical poetry (1590 – 1670). The idea of this style was that of exploring ideas through intricate and startling images. The themes of metaphysical poems are usually that of religion, love or wordplay. Metaphysical poems tend to have underlying themes, often written with the use of conceits and metaphorical contexts. Both ‘The Sun Rising’ and ‘To His Coy Mistress’ are love poems. They show their feelings for a loved one in different ways, blending their own style, complex images and exceptional language into their writing.

          ‘To His Coy Mistress’ can be seen as a slightly more belligerent poem when compared with the more relaxing ‘The Rising Sun. Andrew Marvell wrote the poem to persuade his young love, or ‘coy mistress’ that they needed to expand and take their relationship to a new level. This can be seen through the structure in which he writes the poem. He has three stanzas, using ‘If’ ‘But’ and ‘Therefore’ in each. This brings across a more argumentative poem in comparison to the conventional love styling of ‘The Rising Sun’.  The ‘If’ in the first stanza, informs us of what the lovers would do if they had all the time in the world, ‘had we but world enough and time’. By saying, ‘Thou by the Indian Ganges’ side should’st rubies find’, the poet creates a vivid image of beauty and exoticness. He cleverly mentioned rubies, a relatively rare and beautiful stone, it captures the deep shade of their love, captured within the stone for eternity. ‘The Sun Rising’ uses Indian images in a more sensual manner, ‘whether both th’Indias of spice and mine’.

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       ‘The Sun Rising’ describes two lovers being awakened by the rising sun, to which the lover is justly perturbed. He portrays this by saying, ‘Busy old fool, unruly sun’, letting out his frustration on the unwelcome intruder. Donne takes this idea and then expands on it, ‘saucy, pedantic wretch’, showing the sun is being rude for intruding on their privacy. Even though he does want the sun to leave them alone, ‘I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink’, he does not want to lose the beautiful sight of lover, ‘but I would not lose her ...

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