How far are John Donne's 'The Flea' and 'The Message', Andrew Marvell's 'To His Coy Mistress' and Shakespeare's sonnets 'XVIII' and 'CXXX' anti-love poems?

How far are John Donne’s ‘The Flea’ and ‘The Message’, Andrew Marvell’s ‘To His Coy Mistress’ and Shakespeare’s sonnets ‘XVIII’ and ‘CXXX’ anti-love poems?

Each of the poems/sonnets are to an extent anti-love, but each of them is anti different types of love. ‘To His Coy Mistress’ and ‘The Flea’ are against ‘romantic love’ but are definitely for ‘physical love’. Each poem is about a man trying to ‘woo’ a woman who has a social vow not to have sex. In this time period (17th Century) when the poem was written, sex was believed to be a “mingling of their bloods”. Therefore, the analogy with this flea is that it has ‘mingled their bloods’; and, in a second, one what the woman did not dare to do. On the other hand, a sonnet like ‘XVIII’ is more anti ‘physical love’ but a lot more for ‘romantic love’. I am going to look at each poem separately and see to what extent they can be seen as being anti-love.

‘To His Coy Mistress’ is a poem that is anti love in the sense of being against romantic love. Marvell begins his argument syllogistically with an “if” clause: if Marvell and his love had all the time and space in the world, he could take time to woo her. Marvell then moves on to explain (with hyperbole) the amount of time he would spend to admiring his beloved. While she was in India, he would be willing to love her from the beginning of time, ‘Love you ten years before the flood’ and that she could not deny him until the Judgement Day ‘Till the conversion of the Jews’. He is using a Biblical analogy here, from when Moses and the Israelites left Egypt, till Judgment Day. He also uses a comparison between ‘vegetable’ love and his own; the ‘vegetable’ love describes the slow growing nature of his affections, and tries to describe the breadth of his love. Marvell describes in great detail how many years he would spend admiring all the parts of her body, ‘An hundred years should go to praise, Thine eyes, and on thy forehead gaze, Two hundred years to adore each breast’. This could be perceived as looking at love from the perspective of ‘making’ love (i.e. having sex) but on the other hand, because he might ‘romantically’ love her so much, he could be saying he would worship her body and love her also. He sums up his pleading by telling her that such a long time is acceptable because she is worth it and so beautiful, ‘For, lady, you deserve this state; Nor would I love at lower rate’.

Marvell then moves on from the ‘contrary-to-fact’ condition in the first part of the poem to confront the women with what he sees as reality by saying, that in fact they do not have all the time in the world and that death will be waiting for them soon, ‘ Time’s winged chariot hurrying near; And yonder all before us lie, Deserts of vast eternity’. Continuing in his dreary portrayal of death, Marvell makes a series of references to the grave: worms eating away at her “long-preserved” virginity, a play on the “ashes to ashes, dust to dust” as in the funerals, ‘And your quaint honor turn to dust, And into ashes all lust’, and finally referring to the grave as an unsuitable place for lovers to embrace, ‘The grave’s a fine and private place, but none, I think, do there embrace’. He’s saying why go to her grave a virgin.

Having finished the second part of his argument (i.e. that life is too short and death is forever) Marvell now makes his proposition for them to make love. Describing her youth through the “dew-like” freshness of her skin and her passion as “instant fires,” he pleads with her to “sport” with him and that they should pounce upon one another like “birds of prey,” ‘ Now lets us sport while we may; And now, like amorous birds of prey’.

Lastly, Marvell tells her that they should throw themselves passionately (with rough strife) at life (Momento Mori). He knows ...

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Having finished the second part of his argument (i.e. that life is too short and death is forever) Marvell now makes his proposition for them to make love. Describing her youth through the “dew-like” freshness of her skin and her passion as “instant fires,” he pleads with her to “sport” with him and that they should pounce upon one another like “birds of prey,” ‘ Now lets us sport while we may; And now, like amorous birds of prey’.

Lastly, Marvell tells her that they should throw themselves passionately (with rough strife) at life (Momento Mori). He knows they cannot cheat death or time, but that they can make the most of what time they have. Marvell basically tried to ‘woo’ (or plead with) a woman who does not what to have sex for social and moral reasons. Marvell is trying to persuade her to have sex with him. Therefore, we cannot say that this poem is anti-love, it’s for physical love but we can say that it is against romantic love as all he really wants to do is to convince this woman to have sex with him. However, we could argue that by some of the language that Marvell uses to plead with the woman, there is a hint at romantic love. We cannot say that this poem is totally anti romantic love because of the language and play on words. Marvell’s main aim is to get the woman to have sex with him, no matter how flowery the language used.

The same can also be said for John Donne’s poem ‘The Flea’. This poem is more anti romantic love in the sense that in this poem, the “I” of the poem is lying in the bed with his lover, who is trying to get her to give her virginity to him. While lying there, he noticed a flea, which has obviously bitten both of them. Donne knows that 17th Century sex was seen as a “mingling of the blood”. He rationalises that by mixing their bloods together in its body, the flea has done what she does not want do, join them together.

Donne goes on to argue that since the flea has in any case done what she has not wanted to do, mingled their blood, then why should they not go on to do it (it being having sex)? To support his argument, he refers to the marriage ceremony, which states that “man and woman shall be one flesh”. He argues that since they have mingled their bloods, and are therefore “one blood”, they are practically “one flesh” and are therefore married. Not only does this reinforce his seductive argument, but it also provides ammunition for him to defend himself when the female does the next logical thing and moves to kill the flea. Donne argues that by spilling his blood and hers, by killing the flea, she is practically committing murder. Not only that, but by breaking the holy bond of marriage she is committing a sacrilege. However, the flea is finally killed, and the poet is forced to change tactics. He argues that killing the flea was easy, and you say it has not harmed us – yielding to me will be just as easy and painless.

The poem borrows a lot of religious imagery, because it helps add ‘Godly’ authority to the poem.

John Donne’s ‘The Flea’ uses inappropriate arguments because Donne says that as the bloods have been mingled in the flea, the woman has already had sex with him (theoretically) then there should be no reason why they should not have sex again. Also, Donne uses inappropriate argument by referring to religion as a basis for his statements. He says that what they are about to do is not only supported by God, and to not do it would be against God’s will.

The two Shakespeare Sonnets are distinctively different. Sonnet ‘XVIII’ is distinct from sonnet ‘CXXX’. I find that sonnet ‘XVIII’ is less anti-love because it is more for romantic love, ‘Shall I compare thee to a Sommer’s Day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate’. Sonnet XVIII is a brilliant and famous sonnet where Shakespeare compares his lover's eternal beauty to the transient beauty of nature. In the first octave Shakespeare compares his lover to a Summer's day, but, at the start of the third quatrain there is a Volta where he begins to tell his lover how
the many imperfections of a Summer's day cannot touch his lover's superior
qualities. His life, and the memory of it, is an eternal summer, and
thus, she has metamorphosed into the standard by which true beauty can and
should be judged. The poet starts the sonnet by asking his lover the
question 'Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?' comparing her to a
summer's day in itself is a delectable plaudit but he then goes on to build
upon the image of his lover as a perfect being by stating the faults of a
summer's day compared to the beauty and excellence of his lover. He tells
her of how the summer winds can be too rough and the weather can change
quickly without warning compared with the temperate and calm nature of his
lover. Shakespeare also tells how summer's end comes too soon and the sun
can be too hot or go behind the clouds and all that is beautiful loses its
beauty, by chance or by nature's planned out course. His lover, however, is
untouched by this and her beauty is immortal, the memory of her life will
not fade, nor lose the beauty that belongs to it and death will never claim
him for his own.

As I read this sonnet I found the personification of the Sun (lines 5 and
6) to be extremely effective in enhancing the romantic and poetic essence of
the sonnet, I felt 'the eye of heaven' and 'his gold complexion' are
excellent uses of language and help the sonnet to flow with more aura.
The poet's only answer to such profound joy and beauty is to ensure that
his lover be forever in human memory, saved from the ultimate oblivion that
accompanies death. He achieves this through his verse, believing that, as
history writes itself, his lover will become one with time as anyone who
reads his words will build up their own picture of incredible beauty,
therefore fashion and changing views will never mean that his lover's beauty
will never die. His words will always bring across the beauty of his
lover. The couplet reaffirms Shakespeare's hope that as long as there is
breath in mankind, his poetry will live on too, and ensure the immortality
of his lover's beauty. Such flowery language does not change the fact that he is still trying to win her over.

"Sonnet CXXX" sounds as if it is mocking all of the other poems of Shakespeare's era. Love poems of this time period made women out to be superficial goddesses. "Sonnet CXXX” takes the love poem to a deeper, more intimate level where looks are no longer important and it is inner beauty that matters. Shakespeare paints this picture using a wonderful combination of metaphors and a simile. He starts the poem out with a simile comparing his mistress' eyes to the sun. He then quickly switches over to using the metaphors to compare the rest of his mistress' characteristics, such as her breasts to snow and hair to wires. This poem is written in the traditional Shakespearean sonnet form. It has three quatrains and a couplet. The rhyme scheme for the poem is ‘ababcdcdefefgg’. The ‘a’ sound is made of an "-un" rhyme while the b sound is made of an "-ed" rhyme. The sound of c is an "-ite" rhyme and the sound of d is a rhyme of "-eeks." The e and f sounds are rhymes of "-o" and "-ound" respectively and the g sound is a rhyme of "-are", which ends the poem. As to the setting of this poem, I would have to agree with Helen Vendlers view on this. It seems as though Shakespeare had just finished reading a sonnet of the era that was written about someone's mistress having eyes like the sun and lips as red as coral. When he sat down and wrote a poem that said the mistress in the latter’s poem must be a goddess. His was not, but he loved her anyway for what she was not. This poem was meant to be a mocking view of all the other love poems around. I feel its format in terms of content and Shakespeare's feelings served two purposes. He wanted first to convey the image that even though his mistress was not as fair as one would hope for, they seemed to share some kind of kinship or bond that no other could share with him, not even his wife. It did not matter to him that she was not as pretty, but only that she is on the same wavelength as he is. Secondly, I feel that he is explaining the fact that he does not necessarily want a "mistress" that is ravishing, and that all of the qualities that other men see in women are not his own and in fact repulse him. He says in line 13 that he loves the woman and that is rare or extraordinary. Which simply means that he cannot believe that he actually does like another woman that is not beautiful to every extent but she offers something more than just good looks, companionship. The picture of true unconditional love is best presented in William Shakespeare's "Sonnet 130." Though his lover's lips are not full, he yearns for them. Though her cheeks are not rosy, he feels her glow. Her hair is certainly not soft and her breath does not project sweet perfume, but he is still truly captivated. She cannot sing to save her life, yet he loves to hear her voice. When she walks you would not call her graceful but he still cherishes her clumsy strides. This is a poem written by a man that has learned to love with his heart and not his eyes.

I think that all the poems/sonnets can to an extent be seen as being anti-love but, none are completely anti-love. To an extent, ‘Sonnet XVIII’ is not anti love as Shakespeare compares his lover's eternal beauty to the transient beauty of nature. But that does make it anti physical love. However, ‘To His Coy Mistress’ or ‘The Flea’ are more anti romantic love as the sole purpose of these poems is to ‘woo’ a lover into having sex.