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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 821.3
EAN num: 9780140422092
ISBN number: 0140422099
Label: Penguin Classics
Manufacturer: Penguin Classics
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 688
Printing Date: August 25, 1977
Publishing house: Penguin Classics
Sale Popularity Level: 32372
Studio: Penguin Classics
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Editor's Notes and Comments:
Product Description:
(Book Jacket Status: Not Jacketed)
Introduction by C. A. Patrides
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Rated by buyers -
I find John Donne's poetry distinctly representative of the 17th century. It oscilates from being passionately sexual to passionately spiritual, and every detail seems to have been considered. The poems are augmented by Donne's allusions, but they are still beautiful to read without pondering the deeper meanings.
I prefer the alphabetized format of this collection, since chronology and subject matter are fairly nebulous when it comes to Donne. The endnotes are brief enough for readers looking for something simple, but add enough interest that those with a more scholarly bent will have plenty to play with.
Rated by buyers -
I am greatly enjoying this book. The notes at the end explain some of Donne's more obscure imagery. A potentially controversial choice by the editor was to change the spelling of many words to more modern forms, which makes the poems easier to read at the expense of authenticity. Some people will like that and some people won't. Another odd choice was to list the poems in alphabetical order, instead of grouping them by subject matter or attemp to list them in approxiamte chronolgical order.
Buy this book and enjoy the breathtaking poems. You could do a lot worse with your time.
Rated by buyers -
Finally, I've found a poet I really like reading. Donne's poems suit me more than Shakespeare's sonnets or Poe's verse, and apart from someone like Yvor Winters, I just don't get modern poetry (apologies to Sylvia Plath fans).
What rings well with me is, well, ringing well! Reading a poem out loud with a bit of drama should just sound good. That's why rap and hip hop can really be considered poetry (well, some rap and hiphop anyway).
A great example of this is Shakespeare's sonnet 129 (The expense of spirit in a waste of shame/Is lust in action; and till action, lust...). Most (not all) of Shakespeare's sonnets are harder to understand than this one, which is why they don't resonate with me as well as I'd like. Donne on the other hand is different; most of what he writes in English sounds good and is immediately understandable.
Not that I understand everything in these poems, there are many contemporary allusions that are lost on me, but there's enough in there that sounds very good to allow me to right away enjoy myself. Here are two great lines, which open the sonnet "Community", to illustrate what I mean by good sound.
Good we must love, and must hate ill,
For ill is ill, and good good still...
There are problems, themselves interesting, that bring discord to a poem. For instance in Donne's England "love" rhymed with "prove" but because yesterday these words don't, a couplet with this rhyme is marred to our 21st century ears.
A personal note: I was in bed reading "Soul Made Flesh" about the discovery that the brain is the seat of consciousness, made by Oxford scholars in 17th century England. I had reached an account of how large audiences of curious onlookers gathered to see doctors perform autopsies. I put the book down and decided to dip into Donne before going to sleep. I flipped out when I read The Damp's opening lines:
When I am dead, and doctors know not why,
And my friends' curiosity
Will have me cut up to survey each part...
Talk about serendipity! Now if I had just read an explanation of these lines in the notes, they would not have meant much to me. But because reading "Soul Made Flesh" had transported me into Donne's England for a few moments, the dramatic effect of the opening was multiplied immensely.
In a nutshell, I find that I love Donne and I recommend this comprehensive easy-to-carry well-annotated edition. My only negative comment is that the editing is a bit unimaginative: the editor places the sonnets in alphabetical order of title simply because there is no accepted canonical ordering... Oh well.
Vincent Poirier, Tokyo
Rated by buyers -
Songs and Sonnets, Epigrams, Elegies, Satyres, Letters, The Anniversaries, Divine Poems. These are some of the categories of this collection of Donne's complete works. The volume also has a short life of Donne, and an overall introduction to his poetry.
Donne, is generally considered the greatest of the Metaphysical poets. His two great subjects are Love and Death, and his passionate intellect dares to connect elements of diverse worlds into a rich metaphorical texture of poetic conceits. The bold comparisons , the bringing of all modes of experience into relation with the Divine mark out his truly great work.
Rated by buyers -
This book of poetry is quite wonderful. Donne's imagery and words are truly beautiful. His poetry displays wit, beauty and perception. Donne wrote in the sixteenth century, but his ideas and thoughts were actually quite modern. His work is incomparable when it comes to displaying the feelings and emotions of love and of friendship. Donne's poetry is often referred to a metaphysical, but it is also witty and fun. He was an extremely intelligent man, and this is reflected in his work. At times the poems can be difficult to understand, but it is well worth taking the time to do so since they are so beautiful
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