Divinity In John Donne's Love Poetry

John Donne is the most influential representative of Metaphysical Poets. He enjoys great fame in the literary circle for his variety and complexity. However, most of the study on him ignores the integrity in his literary composition. Thus, Donne's poetry is often neatly divided into the halves of early profane love poetry and late saintly religious poetry which have nothing in common on type or subject. This is a simplification of Donne's poetry. Furthermore, since the exact time of Donne's poetic composition remains controversial, how can we assert the early or late period? Having consulted the modern study on Donne, the author of this dissertation believes that Donne's love poetry and religious poetry share the same period and relevant subject though they are of different types. The secular and the divine intermingle in both of them.This dissertation puts emphasis on Donne's love poetry and aims to explore the divinity in his love poetry, adopting the text analysis and Historical-Biographical approach. As people's cognition is from phenomena to quality, the author analyzes the divinity of the love poems from two perspectives: the permeation of religious images and allusions, the metaphor between the secular love and divine love. Then, it goes on to search the cause of divinity in his love poetry and realizes that the divinity is the embodiment of Donne's agony in religious conversion. Much critical attention has been paid to Donne's conceit or other poetic art, while this dissertation offers a comparatively different perspective for the study on Donne's love poetry.There are five chapters in this dissertation. Chapter One serves as a brief introduction to Donne and the literature review on his love poetry. Chapter Two scrutinizes the religious images of"chaos","order","angel"and"saint,"and Biblical allusions of"Paradise,""Moses'approaching the burning bush,""Jesus'Ascension,"and so on, in certain love poems. Chapter Three goes deeper to the metaphor between the secular love and the divine love. In the secular arena, Donne condemns the inconstancy of women harshly. Nevertheless, the severer his condemnation is, the more his aspiration for union of body and soul with women becomes! In the divine arena, the situation is similar, the more he fears God's abandonment, the more he thirsts for God's salvation! Donne's condemnation on women's inconstancy echoes the self-accusation of his conversion from Catholicism to the Anglican Church; his aspiration for union of body and soul mirrors his yearning for God's salvation. Donne's pursuit of secular love and aspiration for divine love are consistent in nature! Chapter Four offers the social background of Donne's love poetry, or in other words, a new perspective for the cause of the divinity. Under the severe pressure of religious persecution and the attraction of secular success, Donne converts from Catholicism to the Anglican Church. The agony of conversion is metaphorically embodied in his love poetry. Chapter Five comes to a conclusion that divinity is a marked characteristic of Donne's love poetry. The conclusion presents itself from two aspects: the permeation of religious images and allusions, the metaphor between the secular love and divine love; and the Divinity roots in and embodies Donne's spiritual agony in religious conversion.