{\b John Donne}.

{\b Date of Birth}.: 1572

{\b Date of Death}.: 31 March 1631

{\b Works}.

Pseudo-Martyr  (1610), Ignatius His Conclave  (1611), An Anatomy of the World  
(1611), Progress of the Soul  (1612), Anniversary  (1612). His sermons were 
published posthumously in three volumes, LXXX Sermons  (1640), Fifty Sermons  
(1649), XXVI Sermons  (1660), all edited by his son John. See also H.J.C. 
Grierson's 1912 edition of his work.

{\b Featured Works}.

'Song', 'The Sun Rising', 'Holy Sonnet XIV', 'Holy Sonnet X', 'Woman's 
Constancy', 'Love's Usury', 'The Canonization', 'The Triple Fool', 'Confined 
Love', 'The Dream', 'A Valediction: Of Weeping', 'Witchcraft by a Picture', 
'The Bait', 'The Primrose', 'The Dissolution', 'Self-Love', 'Holy Sonnet I', 
'Holy Sonnet II', 'Holy Sonnet III', 'Holy Sonnet IV', 'Holy Sonnet V', 'Holy 
Sonnet VI', 'Holy Sonnet VII', 'Holy Sonnet VIII', 'Holy Sonnet XI', 'Holy 
Sonnet XII', 'Holy Sonnet XV', 'Holy Sonnet XVI', 'Holy Sonnet XVIII', 'Holy 
Sonnet XIX', 'The Flea', 'The Indifferent', 'The Good-Morrow', 'The 
Apparition', 'Love's Deity', 'The Prohibition', 'Elegy I: Jealousy', 'Elegy 
II: The Anagram', 'Elegy III: Change', 'Elegy IV: The Perfume', 'Elegy V: His 
Picture', 'Elegy VI', 'Elegy VII', 'Elegy VIII: The Comparison', 'Elegy IX: 
The Autumnal', 'Elegy X: The Dream', 'Break of Day', 'Holy Sonnet IX', 'Holy 
Sonnet XIII', 'Elergy XVI: On His Mistress', 'A Hymn to Christ at the Author's 
Last Going into Germany', 'Elegy XVIII: Love's Progress', 'The Funeral', 'A 
Hymn to God the Father', 'Holy Sonnet XVII', 'The Damp'.

{\b General Comment}.

John Donne was born in London into an old Roman Catholic family at a time when 
anti-Catholic feeling in England was near its height. He was educated at home 
by Catholic tutors. He attended both Oxford and Cambridge Universities, as 
well as Lincoln's Inn as a trainee lawyer, he never took any academic degrees 
and never practised law. In 1593 his younger brother Henry died in prison 
after being arrested for harbouring a priest. Somewhere around this time Donne 
renounced his faith. He read enormously in divinity, medicine, law and the 
classics and wrote to display his learning and wit. In 1598 he was appointed 
private secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton and sat in Elizabeth's last 
parliament. In 1601 he secretly married seventeen-year-old Ann More, Lady 
Egerton's niece. Sir George More had Donne imprisoned for a brief period and 
dismissed from his post. The next fourteen years were marked by his attempts 
to live down his shame, and to try to make a living to support his growing 
family, but depending largely on the charity of friends and his wife's 
relations.

On the suggestion of James I who approved of the anti-Catholic sentiments of 
Pseudo-Martyr  (1610), Donne took orders in 1615. In due course he was 
appointed Reader in Divinity at Lincoln's Inn and was deemed a great preacher. 
His wife died in 1617 aged thirty-three after giving birth to their twelfth 
child. In 1618 he went as chaplain to the Earl of Doncaster in his embassy to 
the German princes. His 'Hymn to Christ at the Author's Last Going into 
Germany', written before the journey, is full of the apprehension of death.  
In 1621 he was made Dean of St Paul's. His private devotions were published in 
1624 and he continued to write sacred poetry almost up to his death. Towards 
the end of his life he became obsessed with death and preached what was called 
his own funeral sermon just a few weeks before he died.

The influence of his poetic style was widely felt in the sixteenth century. He 
tangibly influenced Andrew Marvell, George Herbert, Henry Vaughan and others, 
and is deemed the greatest of what John Dryden and Samuel Johnson called the 
'metaphysical poets'.