the flea

Question 1

essence of the poem

Answer 1

Erotic, carpe diem poem where speaker attempts to seduce a woman into bed through witty
argument of their blood already being mingled in a flea (conceit).

Question 2

What is conceit?

Answer 2

a figure of speech when two vastly different objects are likened together by similes or metaphors

Question 3

John Donne

Answer 3

-Born into a recusant family, but later became cleric for C of E and the Dean of St Pauls Cathedral under royal patronage
-A metaphysical poet, also a lawyer

Question 4

What is metaphysical poetry?

Answer 4

‘beyond’ ‘physical’
- sensual style
-Eroticism of a grotesque image with a witty tone, satirising conventional love poetry
-Often uses methods such as unusual rhyme schemes, double entendre and ambiguous humour.

Question 5

‘Carpe diem’

Answer 5

= ‘seize the day’
by accepting his physical advances, suggests impatience of social decorum

Question 6

‘Mark but this flea, and mark in this’

Answer 6

Imperatives are assertive

Question 7

‘How little that which thou deny’st me is’

Answer 7

• trivalises her virginity ‘little’ disregards society’s impression that pre-marital sex is a sin
• what a ladies social respectability and future prospects hinge on
• contextually, virginity at it’s most due to political power, Elizabeth I vowed herself to a life of chastity and instead ‘wed herself to her country’

Question 8

‘It sucked me first, and now sucks thee, And in this flea, our two bloods mingled be’

Answer 8

-Sexual verbs
-Sex believed to be mingling of bodily fluids

Question 9

‘And pampered swells’

Answer 9

double entendre, euphemism

Question 10

Effect of last three lines indented

Answer 10

Helps sestet build sound and logical argument, relates to his career as a lawyer

Question 11

‘three lives in one flea spare’
‘And sacrilege, three sins in killing three’

Answer 11

Biblical imagery (holy trinity), 3 persons in one godhead. Marriage is a joining of woman and man by God.
-Religious language, trying to persuade a religious woman?

Question 12

‘O stay’

Answer 12

-Ecphonesis, statement / expression of passion
-There is unseen action between the stanzas

Question 13

Effect of half-rhyme
‘Spare’ , ‘Are’

Answer 13

The speaker is not wholly convinced of his own argument.

Question 14

‘Our marriage bed, and marriage temple is’

Answer 14

• sacred + holy
• ironic as audacious comparision would seem sacreligious by some
• determiner ‘our’, established own version of marriage

Question 15

‘And sacrilege, three sins in killing three’

Answer 15

• Idea of the holy trinity
  
  • 3 persons in 1 god head
  • alike man and woman joined in
    marriage by God

Question 16

‘Purpled thy nail in blood of innocence?’
‘Wherein could this flea guilty be, Except in that drop which it sucked from thee?’

Answer 16

• lover has killed the flea, triumphant over his logic in doing so
• what sins has it commited?
• fleas were used a symbols of erotica due to their free access to the female body , envious of flea
• also linked to disease, insignificant in animal kingdom

Question 17

‘Yet thou triumph’st, and say’st that thou Find’st not thyself, nor me, the weaker now’

Answer 17

Speaker rejects her sentiment - neither is less noble for killing the flea. The woman would lose no more honour in having sex than what she did in killing it - harnesses logic in an attempt to fulfill his desires - seeks to get last word.

Question 18

Metre

Answer 18

alternates between iambic pentameter and tetrameter, representing changing argument

Question 19

when was the poem written? what were the attitudes towards love at the time?

Answer 19

1590’s during the renaissance

Love poetry in the Renaissance often expressed sexual or romantic passion, but it could also serve a variety of political, social and religious ends.
Poets described love as an overpowering force, both spiritual and sexual. For most people, however, marriage was a more practical matter.