Love in Molières play, Tartuffe, John Donne’s Canonization, and Crashaws On the Wounds of Our Cru :: Comparison Compare Contrast Essays

Love in Molires play, Tartuffe, John Donnes Canonization, and Crashaws On the Wounds of Our Crucified LordOther than being examples of almost of the best literature of the seventeenth century, the three works listed in the epithet of this essay dont seem to fit very well together. Or do they maybe after all. Creativity consists of connecting things that dont always seem to be related. whole three of these works of literature deal with the various aspects of love--both human and divine. preliminary this semester I read about the Italian poet, Petrarch, whose sonnets followed certain romantic conventions as he recounted his unrequited love for Laura. In his poem, Canonization, John Donne seems, at get-go glance, to be making fun of himself according to the conventions of courtly love. The poet is upset with an unreal opponent. In the first stanza he tells him, For Gods sake, let me love in quiet Go about your own business. Then in the second stanza he admits that his love cant co mp ar with the love of a poet whose tears are suitable to sink a ship, whose heated passion brings a fever as fatal as the black death. So the tone appears to be wry amusement, self mockery. Thus we are surprised when the poem takes a much serious turn. This light-hearted tone tricks us as readers we seem to be set with Donnes imaginary foe--we who go about the business of life concerned with much(prenominal) mundane matters as crop failures, plagues, wars and lawsuits, work study, pizza parties, Reason and love story tests. The poet challenges us Go ahead Call us flies if thats what you speak out we are. The fly during the Renaissance symbolized shortness of life, human mortality, or lust itself--uncontrolled sexuality. charge is another enounce for atomic number 48 a candle excessively reminds us of the brevity of life--of lust like fire that represents sexual desire and destruction. Finally, the word die had sexual overtones in the Renaissance it was used to refer to sexual climax sometimes called the little death. People thought that sexual activity dead away ones vital forces, shortened ones life. The eagle and the dove image win a natural transition to the phoenix, that mythical bird that is reborn from ashes. They also represent traditional symbols of masculine strength and activity and of feminine fragrancy and passivity. We see how opposites are brought together in love. While the fly and the candle suggest physical love the reference to the three birds brings together opposites into a complimentary whole--we find in us two very diametrical kinds of birds and the Phoenix of us one by us, we two being one, are it.