SUICIDE DISCOURSE

Abstract

John Donne, England’s premier seventeenth-century metaphysical poet, has long intrigued scholars with the inclusion of elements both sacred and profane in much of his oeuvre. The following essay explores Donne’s use of reading and writing in sexual—but nonetheless holy—contexts, primarily in his poetry, but also in his Devotions upon Emergent Occasions. An analysis of these bodily-textual metaphors, in addition to a comparison with similar work by Donne’s contemporaries, reveals a distinct trajectory in Donne’s work over time. Brazenly rakish in youth, the aging poet returns his pen to the authorial hand of God, a move that signifies not only Donne’s growth as an individual bu