Song - John Donne

University Degree European Languages, Literature and related subjects

1. Donne sees human love as a power that can resist change or decay in the world. How does Donne affirm this power in his love poetry? Base your essay on one of Donne’s love poems

Song [Go and catch a falling star] is an aged piece of literature written by John Donne. The poet shows his skepticism towards the foundation of true love and the finding of a “pure” woman. He exercises sarcasm through metaphorical terms to convey that attaining love and its power to refute change. The poem is divided into three stanzas and each stanza portrays different stories and perspectives of the poet towards true love and the pure nature of women, and the attainment of love. Donne's Songs does not describe a single unchanging view of love; they express a wide variety of emotions and attitudes (over varying stanzas), as if Donne himself were trying to define his experience of love through his poetry. Love can be an experience of the body, the soul, or both; it can be a religious experience, or merely a sensual one, and it can give rise to emotions ranging from ecstasy to despair.

The poet shows his determined perspective regarding discovering true love over time. The first stanza submits a sense of absolute impracticality; as it states states; “Go and catch a falling star,” and as it is known by all it is not achievable to “catch a falling star”. Falling stars are a cause of great destruction and hence the poet compares a falling star to the nature of women. He shows that the nature of a woman is similar to a star; both are destructive and will cause damage. This shows the skepticism Donne possesses of ever finding love. A mandrake root is a plant, which can take human form, nevertheless when it does it, is always of a male, meaning it is impossible to make pregnant. “Envies stinging” is impossible to avoid and hence underlines the reality of Donne’s skepticism found in the poem. Additional exemplars include; “Or who cleft the devil’s foot,’ ‘Teach me to hear mermaids singing.” To teach one to hear the mermaids sing is yet again another instance of Donne’s sarcasm. Mermaids, along with the devil are non-physical and forged aspects of stories, myths and interpretations.

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An alteration in tone is experienced through the succeeding stanza and the first three lines from the third stanza. Both the second and the third stanza start off with a hypothetical beginning; by an “if” and therefore the poet exposes the finding of true love as being hypothetical and impossible. The second stanza fundamentally tells a tale through the first four sentences. The poet addresses a character, possibly a male and another character, whose information is not disclosed and this is done through the second stanza where he states that “If thou be' st born to strange sights, Things invisible to see,” it seems that the poet is comparing true love to be invisible and non existent in a sense. The next three sentences; “Ride ten thousand days and nights, Till Age snow white hairs on thee; Thou, when thou return'st, wilt tell me,” shows that one of the character that the poet has employed; the second character is collectively talking to the male and stating that he must go onto an expedition where he must journey for days and days onwards, until his hair turns grey and if he finds true love, he must return and share his knowledge with the this second character. The rest of the stanza plays off this sense of a command where the poet states; “And swear, No where, Lives a woman true, and fair. –.” This stanza possess that the character Donne employs does not loose this faith in the possibility of finding love, even after his prolonged journey. Donne’s affirmation that love resists change can be observed mainly through this stanza. Donne shows his bitterness towards women through the course of the second stanza where he shows that it is impossible to find a pure woman along with true love or any of the two. He clearly states, through his personal perspective, that finding true love is difficult. Donne’s comparisons, along with his tone, are mostly metaphorical where he, in a sense, portrays women and love together as being only a product of hard work and nothing else.

Donne also shows his true skepticism towards true love during the course of the third stanza. The stanza starts off with; “If thou find'st one, let me know, such pilgrimage were sweet. Yet do not, I would not go,” It appears that the second character that was supposedly brought up in the second stanza is actually the poet not a physical character from the poem or anyone relating to the first character. An undeviating relation is not obvious but one can conclude that a correlation may be present. The second character is the poet asking that the male or the first character should come to him/her if they find a pure woman and true love if it is possible to attain and tell them about her or the love. The sentences; “Such pilgrimage were sweet. Yet do not, I would not go,” shows the strong belief of the poet. A pilgrimage is a journey made to some sacred place as an act of religious devotion habitually for a superior purpose. Donne compares attaining love with this spiritual journey; a pilgrimage is not a journey completed over days, it takes weeks, months, or even years. Donne affirms that finding love is a long journey, yet its seeker does not eliminate the lust for love, despite the journeys hardships.

The poet states that even though you may find this true love close to you, even though you find her or this true love, even though you take the time to approach this person and develop a relationship that means the world to you, even though this relationship is the most important aspect of your life, this relationship may be the final creation of your hard work and you may have discovered what you were looking for but in the end your heart will be broken and you will suffer. This is shown through; “Though at next door we might meet, though she were true, when you met her, and last, till you write your letter, yet she, Will be, False, ere I come, to two, or three.” Donne does not consider that true love can ever be originated; yet the journey and need for love remain resistive over time as it comes to change. Donne expresses an enormously wide range of feelings in his work, all relating to the experience of love, but varying from the heights of ecstasy to the depths of despair. This variety of feeling lends Donne's poetry much of its impact, for we seem to be reading an individual's personal experience of love, and not just a poet's contribution to a long-standing tradition of poetic love.

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