Metaphysical Poetry – 17th century

1. Metaphysical Poetry – 17th century • A witty, intellectual, ornamental poetry • The term ‘metaphysical” was used by Augustan poets to reprove „unnaturalness”. • Unnaturalness? Or intricacy and originality? • Metaphysical conceit

2. 1572 – 1631 From a Roman Catholic family Studied at Oxford and Cambridge but couldn’t get a degree because of his religion Eventually joined the Anglican church after the death of his brother John Donne

3. Appointed a secretary to Sir John Egerton in 1598 • 1601 – secretly married Anne More, the 16-year-old niece of Lady Egerton • No dowry / imprisonment • Social and financial instability, many children • His wife died at the age of 33, giving birth to a 12th child (stillborn) - 1617 • 1621 – Donne became dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral

4. Mark but this flea, and mark in this,    How little that which thou deniest me is;    Me it sucked first, and now sucks thee, And in this flea our two bloods mingled be;    Thou know’st that this cannot be said A sin, or shame, or loss of maidenhead,     Yet this enjoys before it woo,     And pampered swells with one blood made of two,     And this, alas, is more than we would do. Oh stay, three lives in one flea spare, Where we almost, nay more than married are.    This flea is you and I, and this Our mariage bed and mariage temple is;    Though parents grudge, and you, we are met,    And cloisterd in these living walls of jet.     Though use make you apt to kill me,     Let not to that, self-murder added be,     And sacrilege, three sins in killing three. Cruel and sudden, hast thou since Purpled thy nail in blood of innocence?    Wherein could this flea guilty be, Except in that drop which it sucked from thee?    Yet thou triumph’st, and say'st that thou    Find’st not thy self, nor me the weaker now;     ’Tis true; then learn how false, fears be:     Just so much honor, when thou yield’st to me,     Will waste, as this flea’s death took life from thee.

5. Had we but world enough, and time,This coyness, lady, were no crime.We would sit down and think which wayTo walk, and pass our long love's day;Thou by the Indian Ganges' sideShouldst rubies find; I by the tideOf Humber would complain. I wouldLove you ten years before the Flood; But at my back I always hearTime's winged chariot hurrying near;And yonder all before us lieDeserts of vast eternity.Thy beauty shall no more be found,Nor, in thy marble vault, shall soundMy echoing song; then worms shall tryThat long preserv'd virginity,And your quaint honour turn to dust,And into ashes all my lust.The grave's a fine and private place,But none I think do there embrace. Now therefore, while the youthful hueSits on thy skin like morning dew,And while thy willing soul transpiresAt every pore with instant fires,Now let us sport us while we may;And now, like am'rous birds of prey,Rather at once our time devour,Than languish in his slow-chapp'd power.Let us roll all our strength, and allOur sweetness, up into one ball;And tear our pleasures with rough strifeThorough the iron gates of life.Thus, though we cannot make our sunStand still, yet we will make him run. Andrew Marvel „To His Coy Mistress”

6. Metaphysical Conceit • A far-fetched comparison in the form of an extended metaphor with a complex logic that governs a poetic passage or the whole poem. • Johnson’s definition: "...a kind of discordia concors; a combination of dissimilar images, or discovery of occult resemblances in things apparently unlike.”

7. Early women writers Paulina Surniak

8. When was the eighteenth century? The ”long eighteenth century” = 1688 – 1832 Other ways of organizing the 18th century: • 1660 (the restoration) to 1789 (the French Revolution) - 1688 to 1837 (Victoria ascends the throne) The Glorious Revolution (James II was replaced by William III) • The Reform Act • (the Representation of the People Act) • changes to the electoral system • of England and Wales.

9. Other names of this period: • Neo-classicism • The Augustan Age • The Age of Reason • Enlightenment • The Georgian Age (1714 -1830)

10. Eighteenthcenturyliterature– briefintroduction • Neo-classicism – interest in Aristotle and other classical authors • The culture of politeness -> self-cultivation • Emphasis on form and order -> heroic couplet • New genre appears -> a novel • The cult of sensibility

11. Politeness • „a system of behaviour, polished by good breeding, and disposes us on all occasions to render ourselves agreeable.” • It’s purpose is to replace „political zeal and religious bigotry with mutual tolerance and understanding”

13. Sensibility • Susceptibility to feeling, veryoftenexpressed as a sympatheticconcern for theanguish of another person. • Evidentin a widerange of writingsbetweenthe 1740s and theend of thecentury • Novels of sensibility (sentimentalnovels) often show howfeeling of distressorsympatheticconcernimprintthemselves on the body (blushing, crying etc.)

14. Novel – an eighteenthcenturyinvention But who is the inventor??? Many theories, but the traditional view is that the Father of the novel is Daniel Defoe. Other „fathers of the novel” are: Henry Fielding Jonathan Swift and Samuel Richardson.

15. Is it really so? Samuel Richardson „Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded” Daniel Defoe „Robinson Crusoe” Jonathan Swift „Gulliver’s Travels” 1688 1705 1719 1726 1740 Aphra Behn „Oroonoko” Eliza Haywood „Love in Excess” Delariviere Manley „The Secret History of Queen Zarah”

16. Womenwritersbefore Jane Austen Frances Brooke Sarah Fielding Sarah Harriet Burney Mary Brunton Fanny Burney Elizabeth Inchbald Charlotte Lennox Maria Edgeworth Mary Wollstonecraft

17. Jane Austen 1775 - 1817 • Born 16 Dec 1775 in Steventon • Seventh child "Jane Daughter of the Revd Mr George Austen Rector of this Parish, & Cassandra his wife was Privately Baptizd Decr 17th 1775 Rec'd into the Church April 5th 1776"

18. Educated in school (needlework, French, spelling, dancing, music) and at home • Her boloved sister is Cassandra. • 1793-95 – she wrote Lady Susan • Before 1796 she wrote Elinor and Marianne, later published as Sense and Sensibility • When she was 20, she met Tom Lefroy. • 1796 – 97 – she worked on First Impressions (later Pride and Prejudice)

19. 1800 – thefamilymoves to Bath • Dec 1802 – shereceivedheronlyproposal of marriage • Harris Bigg-Wither, herfriend’sbrother, proposed and sheaccepted. • By nextmorning, sherealisedshehadmade a mistake and withdrewheracceptance.

20. Mr Austen diesin 1805. • Jane, Cassandra and theirmotherareleftin a difficult financial position. • 1809 – Edward, a brotheradopted by thefamily of Knights, offersthem a cottage in Chawton. • Life inthe country isquiet and Jane writesagain. • Her brother Henry sendsthemanuscript of Sense and Sensibilityto thepublisher and itisaccepted. Thebookispublishedin 1811,.

30. 1813 – Pride and Prejudice is published • 1814 – Mansfield Park • 1815 – Emma • 1816 – Austen begins to write Persuasion • The same year she begins to feel unwell. • 1817 – she moves to Winchester, and dies on 18 July 1917. Posthumous publication: • 1817 – Persuasion and Northanger Abbey