English Literature / Unit 8 ENL 0704 short lesson, about 20 seconds
The Holy Sonnets: "Death, Be Not Proud"
Captions available
The idea
In Holy Sonnet ten, printed in sixteen thirty-three, Donne addresses Death by apostrophe: "Death be not proud," for Death is only a sleep, a "slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men," and will itself die. Donne also wrote "No man is an island."
In practice
Death addressed, belittled, and finally killed.
Where people slip
The poem is a paradox argued to its end.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
Something wrong in this lesson? Flag it · Sources for English Literature