In the house that I grew up in we had a book of poetry of Donne, but I payed little account to it, and I had only the vaguest knowledge of who he was. I’d rate this episode B-.
This episode did a great job of going over his life and works. I’d not realised when exactly he was working, and it turns out he was writing a good bit earlier than I had thought.
He was writing between the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century. He did just a little before the end of the reign of Charles the first. He fought the Spanish alongside SIr Walter Raleigh.
His extended family had catholic sympathies, at a time when it was dangerous.
His career in court stalled when he married someone that was not approved of. This stalled his diplomatic career at court.
Later he became a priest and his sermon writing become a core part of his literary output.
He seems to have been a great fan of whorehouses.
His poetry is visceral, bawdy.
In later life he because a royal Chaplin and dean of St Paul’s cathedral.
After listening to the episode I bought a copy of Donne’s works. There is a lot more than I was expecting. I neither loved nor loathed it, could see the great force of writing in it, but also saw that the style is too far removed from me to touch me.
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If you want to dig into in our time episodes more there is a fantastic site that allows you to explore the archive in all sorts of ways: https://genmon.github.io/braggoscope/