Historical Context and John Donne (The Sunne Rising)

There is no such thing as a neutral writer, or for that matter, a neutral poet; a writer always imparts his or her own beliefs and views into their material. These views and beliefs are all generated by the writer’s cultural and biographical context, and so an understanding of the writer’s history, and knowledge of their time period in history, is of extreme value with regards to understanding their works. Indeed, it is also vital when attempting to determine the precise meaning or feeling that they were trying to convey. John Donne’s poetry is no exception, and knowledge of his biographical and cultural context enhances our understanding of his poem, The Sunne Rising. Without it of course, generating accurate meaning would be extremely difficult.

Sixteenth Century England was a time of great change; the Church was reforming, England was expanding its borders and territories to different, far, and new parts of the world, and an interest in the classical literature and learnin...