How The Complete English Poems drew on 1 Corinthians
A documented line of influence: John Donne demonstrably engaged Paul’s work. The commentary below is Gröblé’s, verbatim from each work’s page.
The source
1 Corinthians
Paul · c. 54
BibleThe influenced
The Complete English Poems
John Donne · 1633
PoetsRelevance
7/10
On The Complete English Poems’s page
- "Death, be not proud" is Paul set to a sonnet's clock
- Donne ends it by collapsing 1 Corinthians 15:26 — death as the last enemy to be destroyed — into "Death, thou shalt die"
- "At the round earth's imagined corners" sounds the same trumpet from 15:51-52, the dead raised at the last; read the chapter first and Donne's bravado reads as scripture, not bluster
On 1 Corinthians’s page
- Paul's resurrection chapter becomes Donne's most famous defiance
- 1 Corinthians 15:26 — "the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death" — turns into the closing thunderclap of "Death, be not proud": "Death, thou shalt die"
- The trumpet of 15:51-52, the dead raised, drives "At the round earth's imagined corners" too — Donne's Holy Sonnets run on Corinthian eschatology