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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
John Donn's "Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" is a metaphysical poem in which the speaker addresses a wife/lover who must remain home while he leaves on a trip. His main poetic device is the...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
The structure of the logical argument is as follows: As virtuous men die in peace, so let us part peacefully, without making our love obvious or public (stanzas 1–2). By analogy, earthquakes create...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
In this poem, the speaker tells his beloved that she ought not to mourn him because their two souls are one. He compares the two of them to a compass of the sort used to draw circles (where a...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
There are two possible interpretations for why the speaker is trying to console his wife in "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning." As the title suggests, the speaker is trying to stop his wife from...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
John Donne uses an unusual metaphor to describe being separated from his beloved in "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning." He likens the souls of himself and his lover to the two legs or feet of a...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
As a female, I find John Donne's persuasion to fall rather flat ("A Vindication: Forbidding Mourning"). First, upon considering the title, I would be rather upset if someone told me that I was not...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Throughout Donne's poem "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" the speaker attempts to comfort his beloved who is upset about their impending separation. The complex imagery helps convey this tone...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
John Donne glorifies the uniqueness of his love through use of original metaphor and imagery in his two poems "The Canonization" and "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning." In both poems Donne sets...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
This is such a great poem! You have a wonderful answer, but in addition to this, Donne uses the metaphysical conceit (an extended metaphor between two extremely unalike items) to lessen the blow...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Donne's "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" (1611) was written when Donne left for an extended trip to Europe (1611-1612) with Sir Robert Drury, Donne's most important and influential patron. As...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
The definition of valediction is “the act of saying farewell." Therefore, in the poem “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning,” the author is saying farewell but forbidding his beloved to mourn. In...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
In "A Valediction: Forbidding Morning" Donne is seeking to draw a contrast between a love which is limited, earthly, and impermanent ("Dull, sublunary lovers' love") and a higher, more spiritual...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Among Donne’s numerous love poems, "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" is one of the most exquisite poems, particularly as it is the expression of a love which is human as well as Divine. He wrote...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
This poem's meaning is in its title: A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning. Vale= Latin for "farewell" and Diction= "speaking". Thus, "A speaking farewell but forbidding...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
John Donne's metaphysical poem makes use of words per se as well as expanding their meanings by means of images or symbols. In his poem " A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning," employs metaphysical...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
John Donne wrote the poem "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" for his wife before leaving on a trip. In it, scholars have found allusions to religious belief, to death, and to science....
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
This poem is known for the use of the metaphysical conceit. The are especially complex and clever comparisons that make surprising connection between two things which at first seem very dissimilar....
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
This line, that comes at the end of the poem, concludes the conceit, or elaborate metaphor, that Donne employs in this remarkable poem to describe the relationship of a union of souls so complete...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
John Donne's "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning Group" contains a metaphysical conceit, an extended metaphor or simile in which the poet draws an ingenious comparison between two very unlike...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
In "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" the speaker encourages his lover to handle their upcoming separation bravely. The first six lines set up a comparison between the calm, dignified death of...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
John Donne cleverly uses on of the most famous of metaphysical conceits in stanza seven of "A Valediction Forbidding Mourning." A metaphysical conceit is like an extended metaphor, in which the...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
The third stanza of the poem, which includes lines 9-12, compares dramatic upheavals on earth and in heaven. Lines 9-10 address these upheavals on earth, specifically as they are manifest in...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
There are several--the speaker compares the love he and his wife share to a compass and to gold. These are examples of metaphorical conceits--extended metaphors or comparisons between two items...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
This is probably the best poem for "absence makes the heart grow fonder." The speaker of the poem is trying to "forbid" his lover from "mourning" the brief separation that is about to occur. He...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Other similes are also found in later stanzas of the poem. In stanza 6, Donne tells his love that their two souls have become one and says that their love will expand "Like gold to airy thinness...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
I would argue that the overwhelming central message of this excellent poem regards the love that the speaker has for his wife, and the way that their years together have forged a kind of connection...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
One feature in "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" that reflects what we, today, label metaphysical poetry is stretched metaphors or conceits. Four of the stretched metaphors, with explanations,...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
The metaphysical poets wrote poems concerned with metaphysical issues. That is to say, they wrote about things beyond the natural, rational, and/or empirical world, having to do with the ultimate...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
This is a metaphysical poem and famous for its metaphysical conceits, which are odd and surprising figures of speech in which one thing is compared to another thing that is very much unlike it....
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Both poems talk about loving a special someone, but not being able to be together. Marvell blames Fate for keeping him away from his love, while Donne liberally believes that each person's journey...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
To understand the meaning of Stanza Three in this amazing poem you need to understand what has already been established in Stanzas One and Two. In these first two stanzas, the speaker is...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
The speaker tries to suggest that death should not cause the couple to be sad or to mourn because their "two souls [...] are one," and though the speaker "must go," the parting is not like "A...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
John Donne's poem, "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning," is a lovely love poem about two lovers parting. The use of the word "mourning" may lead the reader to think of death, however research...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Let us remember that the speaker of this poem is telling his wife not to mourn him when he dies, as the title suggests. The first two stanzas of this unforgettable poem therefore urge the wife to...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
I would say that Donne uses this title because it sums up the point that the speaker is trying to make. It is telling the speaker's love that, although they are parting, there is no reason for...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
The speaker's claim is that separation will not be end of the relationship he has with his love. The title of the poem, valediction, means a request of a command -- to forbid mourning. The poem...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
What the speaker is saying here is that being moved farther apart does not make him and his love any less connected. He is likening their love to gold. He is saying that both of them can be...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
This poem contains two characters, a man and his wife. The man is leaving on a long journey and says "Goodbye" (a Valediction) to his a wife he loves. He tells her not to cry or be sad...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
The Metaphysical Poets were known for their use of extended metaphors (conceits). While some poets associated with this group did address subjects and ideas that we would call metaphysical ("above"...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
In order to nail this question, you need to look at the stanza in which he actually uses the phrase. Dull sublunary lovers' love (Whose soul is sense) cannot admit Absence, because it doth...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
A conceit is an extended, clever metaphor that is usually considered pushed to its end degree. In "Valediction: Forbidding Mourning," Donne is speaking to his wife, whom he must leave to go on a...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
This poem is about a man's telling his beloved not to mourn for him, or have any outward display of emotion about this leaving because their love is greater than that kind of display. He is very...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Discuss what Donne means by "laity" in the second stanza:'Twere profanation of our joys To tell the laity our love. Laity are the common people, a term which is typically resevered...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Let us remember the central image that forms such a major part of this excellent poem. The conceit, or surprising figure of speech that is renowned in this poem is the comparison of the speaker in...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Religion through his characters? An interesting and challenging question. In "Break of Day," there is no explicit mention of religion. Therefore, you must work with qualities and images associated...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Donne achieves this through his use of comparison; for example, he compares the love of the narrator and his lover to a compass, with her being the stationary foot and he being the foot that moves....
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
If I understand your question correctly, you are to relate the opening stanzas to the subject or theme of the poem and show how the opening connects to the poem's ending. The first two stanzas...
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A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
The metaphysical conceits are the speaker's love as compared to the compass and the speaker's love compared to gold "to airy thinness beat"--it only spreads when beaten, but does not...
