Question

In Death, Be Not Proud by John Donne, why does the poet feel that Death is arrogant?

Accepted Answer

The concept of death and dying is powerful in the minds of most people. To manage the intense feelings associated with a discussion of death, John Donne personifies death in Death, Be Not Proud, and proceeds to discredit it because, although some may think that death is "mighty and dreadful," he maintains that  "thou art not so." Death, in its personified form, is arrogant because it thinks that it is the end of life but Donne points out that it is only "One short sleep." Death cannot get the better of man so Donne wonders why it feels as if it has achieved something when "our best men with thee do go" because, when they die, they simply "Rest (of) their bones."
The arrogance as Death "swell'st thou then" as it thinks that "thou dost overthrow" is unacceptable to Donne and Death is actually the entity that is defeated and overcome every time. It is nothing more than a transition and, whilst everyone must die, "we wake eternally"  and therefore we are no longer dead which shows that, in fact, it is Death that "shalt die."

Answer

In this poem, the speaker directly addresses and mocks a personification of death. He implies that "Death" is proud or arrogant because it thinks that it "overthrow(s)" its victims. In other words, "Death" is arrogant because it thinks that it is able to completely conquer the people it takes.
However, the speaker says that "Death" overthrows its victims only temporarily. The speaker compares death to sleep, which is peaceful, restorative, and nothing to be afraid of. The speaker also says that death is, in fact, ultimately a good thing in that it brings about the "soul's delivery" and the moment when "we awake eternally." Here, the poet is implying that death's victory over mankind is really not a victory at all. Death doesn't overthrow its victims but rather helps them to move into the better world of the afterlife, where the soul is free and life is eternal. Death is thus reduced from a conqueror to an unwitting helper, and its arrogance thereby undermined.
John Donne had a fascination with death that is evident in much of his writing. This was in part due to his own poor health but also in part because he lived through a time of high mortality rates. Renaissance England was the time of the bubonic plague and also of endemic typhus, smallpox, and cholera. More than one in ten children died before their first birthday. Public executions were also popular public events. Donne wrote this poem in 1609, when he was 36 years old. The average life expectancy at this time was 42 years old. With all this in mind, it's easy to understand why Donne would write a poem like this, aggressively confronting death as arrogant.

Death, be not proud

In Death, Be Not Proud by John Donne, why does the poet feel that Death is arrogant?

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