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A Selection of Divine Poems - cover
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A Selection of Divine Poems

John Donne

Narrator LibriVox Community

Publisher: LibriVox

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Summary

John Donne was an English Jacobean preacher, sometime lawyer, later in life a Member of Parliament and Royal Chaplain. Marrying for love against the wishes of his influential father-in-law; Donne's career was cast into shadow: forcing him to support his wife, Anne, as best he might under a specter of unforgiving penury.   
Despite such hardships - perhaps because of them - Donne's writings demonstrate a mastery of poetry layered with metaphysical meaning and mystery: which continues to delight and challenge modern-day readers. Donne's "divine poems" - the focus of this collection - present profound theological insights using absorbing allegories and beautiful imagery.  
At the end of Donne's life - as his health deteriorated under illnesses of increasing severity - his poetry served him as: distraction, consolation, and even "public confession". With them, Donne cheerfully but soberly faces the limits of his own mortality: and contemplates the mysteries that lie beyond the grave.  
(Introduction by Godsend)
Duration: about 1 hour (00:48:35)
Publishing date: 2014-08-25; Copyright Year: 1650. Copyright Statment: —