Ecstatic Passion Under Poetic Wisdom

In the seventeenth century, the Metaphysical poets emerged in Britain with John Donneas the leading figure, whose works mainly focused on the philosophical speculation andideological expression of poetry. The Metaphysical love poetry bears a various range oftypes: the eulogizing of love, and the suspecting of love; the praise of the lover, and thecriticism of the lover. Applying the approach of Cultural Genesis to re-interpret theMetaphysical love poetry, this thesis explores the historical sources and the causes forvariation of the traditional ideas, thereby investigating the ideological origin, developmentand changes of the love poetry.This thesis contains five parts. The first part is the introduction of the MetaphysicalSchool, Cultural Genesis, and poetic wisdom with a brief interview of research status in theacademic circle, and then putting forward the research purpose and significance. The secondto the forth parts introduce the three themes of the Metaphysical love poetry, namely, CarpeDiem, Soul and Body, and Beauty. Complying with the sequence of occurrence,development and the influence on reality, world and future, this thesis makes an intensivestudy of the themes by a close integration with the theory of homology and analogy inCultural Genesis, aiming to discover a solid and dynamic research ideas of the verticaldevelopment and horizontal intertwinement in the study of a specific cultural phenomenon.The conclusion part summarizes briefly from several aspects, such as the themes, theinterpretation of Cultural Genesis to the Metaphysical love, and the research significance.The poetic wisdom of the Metaphysical poets refers to their philosophical speculationwhich combines their meditation on the traditional ideas, earthly existence, and futuredevelopment with the realistic expectations to put the love poetry back to reality fromromance, thereby advocating people to live for now, and to live to their hearts’ content.