Investigation into the Motives of John Donne

Born in the late 1500s, John Donne created some of the most impactful poetry of his time. Considered as the precursor to metaphysical poetry, Donne’s poetry contains far-fetched comparisons and a spoken tone, extremely different from the poetry at the time. On the surface, his poetry seems to have overly complicated themes, but in all actuality, most of his poetry deals with love and death. Before this, no one had heard of this style of poetry, making Donne one of the first metaphysical poets.

The use of this style, along with the development of Sigmund Freud and Erik Erikson’s theories on personality, have focused the attention of many scholars and psychologists to his work. He “wrote some of the most passionate love poems and most moving religious verse in the English language”.

His contradictory poetic themes lead readers to believe he had a split personality: the lonely lover “Jack Donne” and the priest “John Donne”. Some believe that this personality and their complicated nature reflect a struggle between his emotions and the forces of life and death.

One needs an explanation of Freud and Erikson’s theories in order to truly understand Donne’s poetry. Freud’s Psychoanalytic theory focuses on “the study of instinctual drives and of the unconscious”. Freud examined the unconscious mind and how its impulses effect people’s everyday lives. Freud deepens this theory by adding the idea of the id, ego and superego. Each part has an essential role in the development of personality.

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The id creates primitive, impulsive desires that push for satisfaction. He claims that people are governed by the pleasure principle. This principle governs mental activity by seeking pleasure and avoiding pain. This is important from an evolutionary standpoint as an organism that avoids pain, and therefore injury, will most likely survive longer. Freud states that this principle wants anything and everything pleasurable, even if it is unattainable. At the opposite end of the spectrum lies the superego. This agency determines how much of an impact morality has on one’s behavior. It provides “love and approval for moral behavior, as well as condemnation and criticism for immoral desires and conduct” (Pearlman & Brandell 53). Contained in this system, the conscience, keeps an individual immediately from acting upon the id’s demands. The ego acts as a mediator for the id and superego.

It contains what Freud calls the “reality principle”. This principle looks at the demands from both the id and superego and determines a realistic way to meet their demands. It will often compromise or postpone action in order to avoid negative effects from society. The development of this system exposes more insight into Donne’s motivations. Born with their ego, humans then develop their id and superego in early childhood. Events during this time can affect the development of these systems, permanently impacting personality. Events in Donne’s life have left his ego and superego damaged, creating a struggle between the reality principle and the pleasure principle.

Born Roman Catholic, Donne could not practice the religion of his parents due to the dictation of the church of England. Arrested for harboring a Catholic priest, Donne’s brother later died in prison of the plague. Donne knew that he could no longer be truly faithful to his religion, but he could not “be satisfied by deserting the Roman church, for that cut him off from the community which had claimed his earliest allegiance”. He was torn between two ways of life. He desired faithfulness to his church, but his country held him away from his faith. He also, like many young people, desired the opposite sex. Trapped in a disjunction with god, he strived for a way to fix it. His fragmented reality led to a need for an outlet and he found a love for poetry.

Donne’s superego and id battled relentlessly about religion. His id desired the connection and faith in the Roman Catholic church, but the superego, knowing the opinion of religion in England, desired to keep face within his community. He feared isolation if he gave into his id impulses. Society would have punished Donne if he allowed his religion or lust show in his day to day life. Donne wanted his society to accept him. He wanted “integration into a greater whole that will swallow up the isolated self” (Carey 61). Donne’s desires would have had the opposite reaction, so he decided to pour them into poetry. There, he could escape his reality into one that he himself created. There, he could be anything he wanted, from “Jack Donne” to “John Donne”. He could satisfy his pleasure principle by replacing it with the reality principle. This works by fulfilling a wish by creating a fantasy reality. The fantasy attempts to correct the reality that doesn’t agree with the person’s desires, replacing the reality principle with a pleasure principle.

Freud also discussed his theory of psychosexual development. This theory states that psychosexual development has five stages: oral, anal, phallic, latent, and genital. When it comes to the analysis of Donne, the first two hold the most impact. Freud states that any interruption or overindulgence at any stage can cause a fixation that can appear later in life. Basically, if a conflict occurs at a stage, the more energy it takes to get through, leaving less energy to get through the later stages. Each stage greatly impacts the development of personality. These stages relate closely with Erik Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development.

Erikson’s theory states that a healthy ego development relies heavily on “on the mastery of specific developmental tasks and normative crises associated with each of eight life cycle stages”. His theory focuses more on how environmental factors create and mold personality. In each stage, vital factors of personality are developed depending on how one handles problems in the environment. The first stage of development takes place during infancy and early childhood. In this stage, basic trust develops from a relationship with one’s parents, mainly the mother. The infant solely relies on its parents for everything. A child learns mistrust early on if their parents do not give them the care that they need. Infants that learn trust have an optimistic outlook on life; while infants that learn mistrust create a pessimistic view of the world.

This stage relates closely to Freud’s oral stage. Difficulties with this stage creates an oral fixation. Oral fixation can manifest as the need to speak a lot, or in Donne’s case, write poetry. Donne’s father dying when he was young, and his mother going into exile due to her religion could have caused issues during this stage, creating a pessimistic view and an oral fixation. Donne’s family was broken from a young age and caused the pessimistic view seen in his poetry. Many of his love poems examine relationships that show “lust holding love at arm’s length”. He lusts for someone to love but due to his pessimistic view of the world, cannot think of them without thinking of the pain associated with the end of love. In Donne’s “The Canonization”, he speaks to someone who is disregarding the way that he and his lover are handling their relationship. For God’s sake hold your tongue, and let me love; Or chide my palsy, or my gout;

My five grey 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. Donne may be speaking to his unconscious in this poem. He might have doubts about the love he and his partner share, exposing this feeling in the poem. His pessimistic views found his way into his fantasy, taking the form of another person. The person that the speaker is addressing is persistent in his disapproval of the relationship. Donne’s unconscious expectation of the worst outcome embodies itself as an outside person in this poem.

The second stage of Erikson’s theory deals with justification vs condemnation. In this stage, a child needs to develop their independence which normally takes place in potty training. They learn what they can and cannot do. Issues with this stage manifest as holding on or letting go of things. Keeping hold of objects can take the form of Donne trying desperately to hold on to his religion and keep a partner by his side. It also creates a feeling of shame and doubt or self-consciousness. This self-consciousness appears in Donne’s work as blatant cockiness. In Donne’s poem “The Flea” the speaker takes the form of a cocky man attempting to seduce a woman with his out-there reasoning.

Oh, stay, three lives in one flea spare, Where we almost, nay more than married are. This flea is you and I, and this Our marriage bed, and marriage temple is; Though parents grudge, and you, w’are met, And cloistered in these living walls of jet. The speaker in this poem makes an outlandish remark about how blood mixing in a flea, has the same impact as the speaker and the woman having intercourse. The speaker’s overconfident attitude could be manifesting from Donne’s unconscious.

One could relate the other stages of Erikson’s theory to Donne’s body of work but the first two have the most impact. Due to the nature of metaphysical poetry, Donne’s work has a very complicated nature. This complicated nature could be due to issues in the development of Donne’s personality. His unconscious desires were projected onto his work, creating two contradictory personas. Torn between his needs and his desires Donne struggled to find his place in a world that did not accept him. Despite his misfortunes, his poetry has enriched the lives of those who read it and founded a new type of poetry.