21 pages • 42 minutes read
John DonneA Valediction: Forbidding Mourning
Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1633A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
The Twin Compasses
Likely the most notable symbol in “A Valediction: Forbidden Mourning” is that of the “twin compasses” (line 26). While mathematical equipment is not rife with abject passion, the way Donne employs the symbolism is unique but effective. A compass has two legs extending from a singular fixed point. Like the speaker and his love in “A Valediction,” both are separate entities but need one another to be whole and perform to the best of their capability. The speaker notes that he and his partner, like the legs of a compass, are actually distinctive; however, through the use of the compass symbol, the speaker redefines what he believes “two” (Lines 25 and 26) to actually mean. The “fix’d foot” (Line 27) of the compass is the speaker’s beloved, who must stay in one place while the speaker goes elsewhere.
The Spherical
Much of Donne’s poetry contains reference to some form of spheres. Often, these spheres are presented take the form of planetary bodies. As an emblem of both the celestial and planetary bodies, these spheres may stand in as larger mechanisms to further a poem’s argument. Through metaphorical leaps and the use of the metaphysical conceit, the presence of spheres in Donne’s poems often signal the planetary rotation of Earth as mirrored in the human spherical eye. Donne’s description of a perfect globe is juxtaposed to the perfect shape of his lover and rather than praise the beloved—as the Petrarchan mode that preceded him may have required—Donne compares her perfect form to one that has no corners or edges and, therefore, no sharp limits.
Donne’s predilection to using the spherical as a poetic motif is demonstrated in, again, the compass symbol. As noted above, the speaker is the wanderer and his love the “fix’d foot” (Line 27) but they occupy these roles in such a way that while the speaker is out adventuring, he “circle[s]” (Line 44) back to his love: “Thy firmness makes my circle just, / And makes me end where I begun” (Lines 44-45).
Gold & Malleability
For Donne, the concept of the physical body was malleable and manifests through the use of various symbols and metaphors in the poem. Abandoning the human form for the sake of the elevation of sex as sacred is one abstract way Donne accomplishes this. However, in “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning,” the poet also uses the image of gold to further his argument of malleability: “Our two souls therefore, which are one, / Though I must go, endure not yet / A breach, but an expansion, / Like gold to airy thinness beat” (Lines 21-24). The possibility and potential of this gold to spread (to be beat) over a far greater surface area symbolizes the two lovers and their expansive love. In other words, the distance between the speaker and his lover will be insubstantial in its firmness or its finality; the lovers are capable of spreading themselves, expanding themselves, to one another just as gold is able to be beat thin as gold leaf.
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By John Donne
