Sexing up the Renaissance

I've just finished watching Simon Schama's BBC programme about John Donne, which was aired last week but thanks to exams I've not been able to watch till today! It's on iPlayer for at least another four days, and is part of the BBC's poetry season. Check out http://www.bbc.co.uk/poetryseason/ - you can vote for your favourite poet. I'm not sure I can pick just one out of the fantastic collection they've got on there! You can also check out Owen Shear's series called 'A Poet's Guide to Britain' - I've watched the first one (about Wordsworth's 'Composed upon Westminster Bridge') and it was very interesting. He's also done programs in the same series on Sylvia Plath, Matthew Arnold and George Mackay Brown so far.

Back to John Donne and Simon Schama. In theory this programme was a good idea, and as far as it went it was an informative, atmospheric production, with a bit of literary analysis thrown in as well. Unfortunately for Mr Schama I am currently studying Donne for an exam on the Renaissance period after having been examined on literature of the Romantic period, so his comment that Donne was "unlike the solitary, brooding poet figure" made me wonder why he would expect Donne to be exhibiting characteristics that were only expected of poets from around 200 years later. His surprised comment that Donne wanted to be admired and be elevated socially also seems odd considering that this is true of virtually every other Renaissance poet, battling for promotion in the court.

Schama is shown discussing the poetry with actress Fiona Shaw, who performs snippets from several of Donne's poems. A good idea, but the male narrative voices of the poems seems a little incongruous with a female voice at times. These conversations are interesting and provide fresh perspectives on the poems but focus on personal responses to the poems - fair enough, considering many people are put off by poetry anyway - but there is no mention of the things that make Donne unique for the period, such as what critics have called his 'mutuality' and speech-like rhythms as well as the different narrative personas he assumes. The way the poems are linked into a biography of Donne's life gives them a very contextual viewpoint which clouds other readings of the poems, and is also misleading as most critics (so I'm told) agree that the usual order of publishing the poems (i.e. love lyric to religious lyric) is not chronological. The emphasis is very much on his love lyrics, presumably in order to sex up what are already fairly erotic poems and make them appealing to the public - again, fair enough, but it ignores the importance of Donne's religious poetry. Schama claims at the very end that he doesn't like the practice of splitting the poet into his two personas - Jack Donne and Dr Donne - yet this is what he has effectively spent the entire hour of documentary in doing.

There are also a few blatant errors, for example some of the background music manages to sound fairly Renaissance-inspired, but some is obviously from a more classical or romantic period - be consistent Mr Schama! He and Fiona Shaw also refer to 'The Canonization' as a sonnet. I wondered whether the stanzas of this poem were in fact sonnets but, although the rhyme scheme is vaguely reminiscent of Petrarchan sonnets it is only 9 lines long - sonnets are always 14 lines!!

All in all, it was a programme worth watching for someone who has never encountered Donne before - and also for those who know his work fairly well too, but be aware that you may be cringing inside at times! After making the Tudors interesting, Schama has obviously turned to the poets of the period and given Donne - at least - his usual dramatic treatment.

Here are two of the poems Schama and Shaw discuss. They're great, go and explore John Donne :)

FOR God's sake hold your tongue, and let me love ;
Or chide my palsy, or my gout ;
My five gray hairs, or ruin'd fortune flout ;
With wealth your state, your mind with arts improve ;
Take you a course, get you a place,
Observe his Honour, or his Grace ;
Or the king's real, or his stamp'd face
Contemplate ; what you will, approve,
So you will let me love.

Alas ! alas ! who's injured by my love?
What merchant's ships have my sighs drown'd?
Who says my tears have overflow'd his ground?
When did my colds a forward spring remove?
When did the heats which my veins fill
Add one more to the plaguy bill?
Soldiers find wars, and lawyers find out still
Litigious men, which quarrels move,
Though she and I do love.

Call's what you will, we are made such by love ;
Call her one, me another fly,
We're tapers too, and at our own cost die,
And we in us find th' eagle and the dove.
The phoenix riddle hath more wit
By us ; we two being one, are it ;
So, to one neutral thing both sexes fit.
We die and rise the same, and prove
Mysterious by this love.

We can die by it, if not live by love,
And if unfit for tomb or hearse
Our legend be, it will be fit for verse ;
And if no piece of chronicle we prove,
We'll build in sonnets pretty rooms ;
As well a well-wrought urn becomes
The greatest ashes, as half-acre tombs,
And by these hymns, all shall approve
Us canonized for love ;

And thus invoke us, "You, whom reverend love
Made one another's hermitage ;
You, to whom love was peace, that now is rage ;
Who did the whole world's soul contract, and drove
Into the glasses of your eyes ;
So made such mirrors, and such spies,
That they did all to you epitomize—
Countries, towns, courts beg from above
A pattern of your love."


Batter my heart, three-person'd God, for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend
Your force to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurp'd town to'another due,
Labor to'admit you, but oh, to no end;
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captiv'd, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly'I love you, and would be lov'd fain,
But am betroth'd unto your enemy;
Divorce me,'untie or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you'enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.