Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1982. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 445-458).

For a long time Mannerism has been a critical term peculiar to the Fine Arts. In the last twenty years it has attracted the attention of literary critics who have sought to clarify its relation to literature in both theory and practice. This thesis draws on the conclusions of such writers and applies them to the Songs and Sonnets of John Donne in an attempt to understand him within the Mannerist context—that is, as a poet expressing characteristics of style, sensibility and culture that are originally typified by a group of sixteenth-century Italian artists. The mode of criticism proceeds on the basis that it is possible to abstract distinctive features from a given style in one art form and apply them, by analogy, to another: thus, discontinuous lines in painting may be seen as analogous to broken sentences in language, or the effect of distorted perspective may be likened to the effect of structural irregularity in a poem. The process may be further supported by reference to cultural, personal or theoretical circumstances that are common to the artist/poets concerned. In this thesis, the views of certain scholars as to the nature of Mannerism have been applied to Donne. Thus his wit, his dramatic techniques, his use of convention and his ambiguity have all been examined in the light of Mannerist principles, and have been further exemplified by reference to the fine and plastic arts. The conclusions reached are that, first, it is possible to approach Donne from a Mannerist viewpoint, that in so doing insights into the nature and organisation of the poetry follow, and that by setting Donne in a European artistic context, something of the insularity and arbitrariness of 'metaphysical' may yield to the broader frame of reference that Mannerism provides. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

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The title of this thesis, JOHN DONNE: ENGLISH MASTER OF GONGORISM, may seem perplexing to some, presumptuous to others. However, the purpose of this thesis will be to present evidence, through a textual study of the poetic style of both John Donne (1572-1631) and Don Luis de Göngora (1561-1627), which will verify the assumption that Donne was poetically influenced by Góngora.

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This study argues that there is an essential unity to John Donne's poems and sermons. Chapter One is a survey of Donne criticism: Ilona Bell suggests Donne "seeks communion, but is continually prepared to recognize disjunction." It is argued that Bell's notion is validated in both genres where Donne renders concrete a movement of thought or emotion through figurative language. Chapter Two examines how the sermons move between the literal sense of scripture, and its multiform spiritual significance. Chapter Three examines the writerly tradition of the Church Fathers in relation to some of Donne's poetry. Augustine read the bible as a unified entity, The Word, and yet understood it through manifold meanings. Donne writes of the union of lovers' souls, yet weaves in the theme of inconstancy and separation. In sum, this study discusses how Donne's creation of figurative meaning produces both his literary intensity, and some parallels of spiritual discovery in his poems and sermons.

Thesis (Ph.D) - University of Queensland, 2006. / Includes bibliography.

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Criticism on Donne???s Holy Sonnets has traditionally been concerned with trying to find an explanation for the doubt, anxiety, and despair that is often expressed by the speaker of those poems. In recent decades, critics have increasingly made recourse to Calvinist theology in an effort to explain these melancholy states of mind. The accounts that such critics provide of ???Calvinism,??? however, have been varied and largely inadequate, mainly because they fail to engage with Calvin???s work at the level it requires. My thesis seeks to correct such deficiencies by providing a detailed reading of Calvin???s view on salvation and the way in which it is received. Calvin argues that we obtain salvation through a firm and certain faith, a faith that is nevertheless attacked by the unbelief that still resides in the believer. In other words, there is a division between the flesh and the spirit within the soul of the believer, which means that he or she is never free (until death) from the sinful temptations of this life. This division, which Calvin invokes to reconcile the uncertainties of the Christian life with the assurance of faith, is dramatised in the Holy Sonnets. In the five poems that I analyse, the speaker is torn between a desire for righteousness and an inclination toward evil, a division that is also represented in the structural qualities of the text. The various temptations which the speaker registers and confronts (and often falls to) are, I believe, a demonstration of Calvin???s view that the regenerate person is in continuous warfare against the remnants of the flesh.

Thesis Ph. D.--Comparative literature--Edmonton--University of Alberta, 2004. / Bibliogr. p. 165-170.