Metaphysical poets, selected poems Contents
- Social / political context
- Religious / philosophical context
- Literary context: ideas and innovations
- Aire and Angels
- A Hymn to God the Father
- A Hymn to God, my God, in my Sicknesse
- A Nocturnall upon St. Lucies day
- At the Round Earth's Imagin'd Corners
- A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
- Synopsis of Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
- Commentary on Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
- Language and tone in Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
- Structure and versification in Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
- Imagery and symbolism in Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
- Themes in Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
- A Valediction: of Weeping
- Batter my heart
- Death be not Proud
- Elegie XIX: Going to Bed
- Elegie XVI: On his Mistris
- Good Friday, 1613. Riding Westward
- Lovers' Infiniteness
- Oh my blacke Soule!
- Satyre III: 'On Religion'
- Show me Deare Christ
- Since She Whom I Lov'd
- Song: Goe, and catche a falling starre
- The Anniversarie
- The Dreame
- The Extasie
- The Flea
- The Good-morrow
- The Sunne Rising
- This is my playes last scene
- Twicknam Garden
- What if this present
- Aaron
- Affliction I
- Death
- Discipline
- Easter Wings
- Jordan I
- Jordan II
- Life
- Love II
- Man
- Prayer I
- Redemption
- The Church-floore
- The Collar
- Vertue
- Hymn in Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament
- Hymn to St Teresa
- St Mary Magdalene, or the Weeper
- To the Countesse of Denbigh
- Ascension - Hymn
- Man
- Regeneration
- The Night
- The Retreate
- The Water-fall
- A Dialogue between Soul and Body
- On a Drop of Dew
- The Coronet
- The Definition of Love
- The Garden
- The Mower Against Gardens
- The Mower to the Glo-Worms
- The Mower's Song
- The Nymph Complaining for the Death of her Faun
- The Picture of Little T.C. in a Prospect of Flowers
- To his Coy Mistress
- Upon Appleton House, to my Lord Fairfax
- An Elegie upon the Death of the Deane of Paul's Dr John Donne
- To a Lady that Desired I would Love her
Language and tone in St Mary Magdalene
The language of nature
Much of the language of St Mary Magdalene derives from the poem's imagery. The diction is often of Nature: flowers especially, vines, April showers. Particularly, as we would expect from the central conceit, the nature diction centres on water: showers, dewdrops, streams, fountains, rivers. The human body is the source of much of this water, particularly the face, though the woman's face is left remarkably undetailed. There is a hint that her hair must be golden (Mary Magdalen was usually depicted in European paintings with the ‘flaming' hair of a harlot) There is a stereotyping of the female body that leaves it strangely characterless. Hair, eyes, cheeks are mentioned, but the point about these features is not to convey human characteristic or emotion, but just how capable they are of new conceits: that is, it is the idea of them that concerns Crashaw. Stanza 15 is a good example.
The language of wealth
There is diction to support images of worth, wealth and royalty. Also, of course, religious language: of Christ as ‘the lamb' (stanza 18); of heaven (for example stanza 12); but strangely, to Protestant ears anyway, mixed with talk of rather sensuous cherubs (stanza 5) and Cupids (stanza 18), the latter deriving from Roman mythology.
More on love language: sacred and divine: see Batter my heart by John Donne
Sorrow is mythologised also (stanza 7) as a queen, if not a goddess. And this is typical of a tendency to personify. The tears are addressed at the end; the cheeks are addressed in stanza 15.
- Consider the language of St Mary Magdalene
- Explain ‘Balsom may be for their own greife' (stanza 10)
- List words that have to do with lushness and profusion
- List words that convey the idea of wealth
- What is ultimately the value of the weeper's tears?
- … and their worth?
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