The Flea

Question 1

Who wrote the flea?

Answer 1

•John Donne in the 1590’s

Question 2

What is the poem about?

Answer 2

•”The flea” is a metaphysical seduction poem in which the speaker tries to convince a woman to sleep with him but using grotesque image of a flea sucking their blood to parade her that she has basically already had sex with him
•The poems argument is based on the renaissance belief that during sec the blood of the two are mingled

Question 3

Literary context

Answer 3

•Metaphysical poetry was a style of poetry popularized in the late 16th and 17th century
•They were concerned with the abstract or the philosophical

Question 4

Themes

Answer 4

•Sex and lust, marriage and religion

Question 5

“Mark but this flea, and mark in this”

Answer 5

•Authoritative start
•Monosyllabic lines gives a condescending attitude

Question 6

“and in this flea, out two bloods mingled be”

Answer 6

•At the time sexual intercourse was believed to involve the mingling of blood
•In this way the speaker asserts that they have already had sex so should stop worrying about “sin, shame or loss of maidenhead”

Question 7

“the flea”

Answer 7

•Used as a conceit
•the speaker uses this as a metaphor for physical intimacy
•Through this extended metaphor, Donne trivializes sin, reducing it to something as insignificant as a flea bite

Question 8

“This flea is you and I, and this/ our marriage bed, and marriage temple”

Answer 8

•Synecdoche
•strained logic
•in his mind the flea is so sacred he upscales its importance to being the marriage bed and temple
•By conflating the sacred (marriage) with the profane (the flea) Donne challenges traditional moral boundaries, suggesting that love and sin are subjective constructs
•The speaker’s rhetorical strategy—marked by persuasive logic and hyperbolic imagery—emphasizes his manipulation of religious and societal norms to justify his desires
•In this way he masterfully entwines sin and love to highlight the complexities of human desire and mock tradition ideas of morality

Question 9

“Three sins in killing three”

Answer 9

•The representation of three relates to the trinity
•he asserts that killing the flea would be the equivalent to triple homicide which is absolutely ridiculous
•He invokes the Trinity to elevate the flea’s significance as it takes the place of God
•This use of religious imagery highlights the speaker’s intellectual cunning while questioning the seriousness of sin in the context of love