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Unit 10: Poetry : John Donne’s “The Good Morrow”

The first line (19) is, poetically speaking, rather superfluous, but it is necessary to make the reader Notes
understand the nature of the metaphor that follows. It is an allusion to a scholastic theory concerning
matter, which is based on Aristotle’s ideas on heavenly and sublunary bodies. According to that
theory, heavenly bodies are eternal, they don’t change, while sublunary matter is composed of elements
in endless changing combinations and warfare. Sublunary matter cannot reach stability because it is
not “mix’d equally”. Donne applies this as a metaphor of eternal love in lines 20-21. If the total love
which is formed with the love of each of the members of the couple is in perfect poise, that love will
be a perfect body, a heavenly being, and it will never die. If love can never cease, it means that the
couple will go on living and loving each other forever. This image is very typical of Donne, and a
perfect sophism.
So much for the figures of speech. One more thing to note: the overtly hyperbolic character of the
metaphors, in accordance with the subject of the poem. In line 4, the hyperbole already present in the
metaphor of sleep is rounded out with an allusion to the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus; these were seven
Christian youths who slept for two hundred years in the cave where they had been immured during
Decius’ persecution (AD 251).
Development of Thought
In the beginning, the poet examines the nature of the first experiences of love. The first set of experiences
is childish—the physical joys of love. The second set of experiences is much richer—it is the experience
of spiritual love in which the voices of one soul are echoed by the other soul. The mature experiences
of love make one disregard the first foolish acts of love, when so to say, the souls were asleep in the
den of seven sleepers. The poet can only dream of true love in the first stage. The atmosphere of sleep,
stupor and dream shows the fleeting and unstable nature of this kind of immature love.
The Dawn of True Love

The past life spent in childish love was a sort of dream and blank. The night of oblivion and unreality
is about to end. The dawn of true love is imminent and it awakens the soul of lovers to the meaning
of true love. This true love makes them open out their hearts to each other, without any fear or
inhibition. Their love for each other is all-absorbing and all-satisfying. They have no delight in other
scenes or places. Each is like a world to the other. This world of love is everywhere. The poet is happy
with the world of love. Let sailors discover new worlds and make charts and maps of the lands they
have discovered. On the other hand, the lovers are content in their own worlds. Each of them has a
world, but the two worlds of the two lovers put together, make one world of love.
The Two Hemispheres
As the lovers look at each other, each of them sees his own image in the other’s eyes. Their looks
reflect the simplicity, purity and honesty of their hearts. Their two faces may be compared to two
hemispheres which together make up a whole world. The two hemispheres of the faces of lovers are
better than the geographical hemispheres, because they do not have the ‘sharp North’ and the ‘declining
West’. The ‘sharp North’ implies coldness and indifference—to which their love is not subject—and
the ‘declining West’ symbolises decay and death from which the lovers are free. According to certain
philosophers, when different elements, which go into the making of a thing, are not harmoniously
mixed, the thing is liable to decay and death. This is not true of their love because their love is
harmonious, and is sweet-blooded. As such their love is immortal and beyond the vagaries of time
and clime.
Critical Comments

In his inimitable way, Donne begins the poem with a question—what thou and I did till we loved? This
rhetoric easily captures the attention of the reader. The poet compares the first stage of love—sex and
enjoyment—with the mature type of love, the harmonious relationship of two souls. There is a lot of
difference between the two types of love. The poet’s wit is seen in his contrast between the two
worlds—the worlds of the lovers and the geographical world. There is no ‘sharp North’ or ‘declining
West’ in the world of lovers. It is a mutual love equal in quality and spirit—balanced and harmonised

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