Donne, Jonson and the Early Seventeenth Century

Unit seven closed on Shakespeare, not of an age but for all time, with Jonson's verdict. This unit belongs to Jonson and to his great contemporary Donne. Its governing idea is that the period's two poetic schools share their subjects and differ in manner: an argument built on a surprising conceit is metaphysical, and a polished song on love and time is Cavalier. We move in three steps: the turbulent politics and the metaphysical poets, Donne and Herbert; then Jonson, his comedy of humours, and the Cavalier poets with Marvell's argued reply; and then the women writers, Bacon's prose, the King James Bible and Jacobean tragedy, before two procedures for reading a conceit and telling the schools apart.

We begin with a divided century and the poets who made argument into poetry.

First, a century of kings and war.

ENL 0701 The Early Seventeenth Century

James the First, king of Scotland, became king of England in sixteen-oh-three and claimed rule by divine right. His son Charles the First clashed with Parliament, and the Civil War ended in Charles's execution in sixteen forty-nine and Cromwell's rule, until the Restoration of sixteen sixty. James, Charles, war, Commonwealth. Politics and religion divide the poets too.

Donne made a new manner.

ENL 0702 John Donne and Metaphysical Poetry

John Donne, born a Roman Catholic, later an Anglican priest and Dean of St Paul's, wrote love poems and holy sonnets of striking, argumentative wit. The anchor describes his metaphysical conceit: an extravagant metaphor drawing unusual parallels between highly dissimilar things, yoked together. Argument, surprise, the far-fetched comparison. Metaphysical names a style, not a school.

One Donne poem uses a compass.

ENL 0703 "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning"

Donne's speaker, leaving on a journey, forbids his wife to mourn: their love is spiritual, so absence cannot divide it. He compares their two souls to "stiff twin compasses": she, the fixed foot, leans after him as he roams, and her firmness makes his circle complete. Two souls as the two legs of a compass. The conceit argues; it does not decorate.

Donne also argued with Death.

ENL 0704 The Holy Sonnets: "Death, Be Not Proud"

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." Death addressed, belittled, and finally killed. The poem is a paradox argued to its end.

Herbert brought the wit to devotion.

ENL 0705 George Herbert and The Temple

George Herbert, a Church of England priest associated with the metaphysical poets, is called one of the foremost devotional lyricists. His collection The Temple appeared after his death, in sixteen thirty-three. His "Easter Wings" is a shaped poem, printed so its lines form wings. Devotion, plain words, shaped poems. Herbert is metaphysical in wit, gentle in tone.

Now the other side: Jonson's classical rules, his comedy, and the Cavalier poets who followed him.

Jonson led a classical following.

ENL 0706 Ben Jonson: Poems and Plays

Ben Jonson, bricklayer's stepson, soldier, actor and playwright, followed classical models and published his own collected Works. He wrote court masques with Inigo Jones and was the leader of men of letters; younger poets called themselves the "Sons of Ben." Classical rules, collected Works, a following. Jonson oversaw his own publication.

His comedy is built on obsessions.

ENL 0707 The Alchemist and the Comedy of Humours

Jonson's comedy of humours, beginning with Every Man in His Humour, builds characters around a single dominating trait or obsession. The Alchemist, of sixteen ten, which the anchor prints, shows con artists exploiting greed while their master is away from London. Characters ruled by one obsession. The humours come from old medicine.

His followers were Royalist singers.

ENL 0708 The Cavalier Poets and Carpe Diem

The Cavalier poets supported Charles the First: Robert Herrick, Richard Lovelace, Thomas Carew and Sir John Suckling. The witness notes the name was first meant to belittle them as roistering gallants. Their lyrics are polished and classical, often on carpe diem, Latin for "seize the day." Royalist, polished, seize the day. Cavalier poets opposed the metaphysical style.

One poem says it in a line.

ENL 0709 Herrick: "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time"

Herrick, a country vicar and self-professed son of Ben, published Hesperides in sixteen forty-eight. "To the Virgins" opens, "Gather ye rose-buds while ye may, / Old Time is still a-flying," and urges young women to marry while youth lasts. Gather rosebuds; time is flying. Carpe diem argues from time's speed.

Marvell argues the same theme.

ENL 0710 Andrew Marvell: "To His Coy Mistress"

Marvell, Milton's assistant as Latin Secretary and later a member of Parliament, argued the carpe diem case in three movements: "Had we but World enough, and Time," he would court her for ages; but time's chariot hurries near; so let them seize their pleasure now. If, but, therefore. The poem is built as a logical argument.

Last, two women writers, the prose that shaped English, and the dark tragedy of the Jacobean stage.

A woman wrote of the Passion.

ENL 0711 Aemilia Lanyer

Aemilia Lanyer published Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum in sixteen eleven, religious poetry that defends women, including Eve. The anchor notes that A. L. Rowse claimed her, on dubious grounds, as Shakespeare's dark lady, and that her work converses with earlier women writers. A woman's Passion poem, defending women. The dark-lady claim is unsupported.

A duchess wrote in every genre.

ENL 0712 Margaret Cavendish

Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, published in many genres: poems, essays, autobiography, natural philosophy, drama, and The Blazing World, an early utopian fiction. Some contemporaries called her eccentric; others admired her. She visited the Royal Society. A duchess writing in every genre. She is a self-conscious female author.

Bacon made prose compact.

ENL 0713 Francis Bacon's Essays

Francis Bacon, philosopher, statesman and jurist, published his first book of Essays in fifteen ninety-seven and expanded it later. His essays are short, aphoristic and quotable; "Of Truth" opens, "What is truth? said jesting Pilate, and would not stay for an answer." Short, pithy, quotable prose. Bacon's essay is compressed, not chatty.

One translation shaped English prose.

ENL 0714 The King James Bible

The King James Version, commissioned in sixteen-oh-four and published in sixteen eleven under James the First, became the standard English Bible for centuries. Its Early Modern English shaped English prose, and English writers allude to it constantly. Sixteen eleven, the Authorized Version. Biblical allusion often draws on its wording.

The stage grew darker under James.

ENL 0715 Jacobean Tragedy: Webster

John Webster, a Jacobean dramatist whose career overlapped Shakespeare's, is best known for The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi, often seen as masterpieces of the early seventeenth-century stage. Jacobean tragedy is darker than Elizabethan, full of corruption and violent ends. Two dark tragedies of corruption. Jacobean means under James the First.

Here is the method for reading a conceit.

ENL 0716 Reading a Metaphysical Conceit

A metaphysical conceit is an argument, so read it as one. Find the two things compared and notice how unlike they are: lovers and a drawing compass, a flea and a marriage bed. List the precise points of likeness the poet claims. Follow the argument the comparison serves: the compass proves that separation cannot divide true lovers. Notice the tone, often witty even on serious subjects. Then name the conclusion. In the Valediction, the fixed foot that makes the circle complete concludes that her constancy ensures his return, so the conceit illustrates constancy, not distance.

Here is the method for telling the schools apart.

ENL 0717 Metaphysical or Cavalier?

The exam can ask which school a passage belongs to. Metaphysical poetry, Donne, Herbert and Marvell, argues, with far-fetched conceits, paradox and rough, speech-like rhythm, moving by if, but and therefore. Cavalier poetry, Herrick, Lovelace, Carew and Suckling, sings, with Jonson's classical polish, smooth rhythm and light themes of love, wine and carpe diem. Ask whether the comparison is surprising and worked out; listen for rugged or musical rhythm; notice an argument pressed or a graceful invitation. "Gather ye rose-buds" is Cavalier; "Had we but World enough, and Time" is metaphysical, though both urge seizing the day.

The capstone gathers the period's manners.

ENL 0718 What the Early Seventeenth Century Leaves

The early seventeenth century, from James the First to the Civil War, gave poetry two manners and prose some of its foundations. Its politics were turbulent: divine right, Charles's quarrel with Parliament, the king's execution in sixteen forty-nine and Cromwell's Commonwealth. Donne argued through extravagant conceits, the compass, Death belittled, and in prose the reminder that no man is an island. Herbert brought that wit to devotion in The Temple, shaping "Easter Wings" on the page, and Marvell argued his Coy Mistress in three movements. Jonson led the other side, a classical poet and playwright whose Alchemist exposes greed and whose Sons of Ben included the Cavaliers, Herrick's rosebuds among them. Lanyer defended Eve and Cavendish wrote in nearly every genre. Bacon made prose quotable, the King James Bible of sixteen eleven gave English its most echoed prose, and Webster's Duchess of Malfi darkened the stage. The schools share subjects, so questions turn on manner.

This unit sorted two schools by manner. We placed the poets in a century of divine right, civil war and Commonwealth. We read Donne's and Herbert's conceits as arguments, asking what each comparison proves. We described Jonson's classical rules and his comedy of humours. We told the Cavalier song from the metaphysical argument, by method rather than subject. And we named Lanyer, Cavendish, Bacon, the King James Bible and Webster. Unit nine, John Milton, gives a whole unit to one poet.