Donne, John

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English poet, one of the metaphysical poets. His work consists of love poems, religious poems, verse satires, and sermons. His sermons rank him with the century's greatest orators, and his fervent poems of love and hate, violent, tender, or abusive, give him a unique position among English poets. A Roman Catholic in his youth, he converted to the Church of England and finally became dean of St Paul's Cathedral, London.

Donne was brought up in the Roman Catholic faith and went to Oxford at an early age to avoid taking the compulsory oath of supremacy at the age of 16. Before becoming a law student at Lincoln's Inn in 1592, he travelled in Europe. During his four years at the law courts he was notorious for his wit and reckless living, and it was probably around this time that he renounced Catholicism. In 1596 he sailed as a volunteer in an expedition against Spain with the Earl of Essex and Walter Raleigh, and on his return became private secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton (c. 1540–1617), Keeper of the Seal. This appointment was ended by his secret marriage in 1601 to Ann More (died 1617), niece of Egerton's wife. They endured many years of poverty, made worse by the births, in rapid succession, of twelve children (of whom seven survived childhood). The more passionate and tender of his love poems were probably written to her.

With the accession of James I, Donne's fortune changed. In 1610 he made a bid for royal patronage with the prose work Pseudo-Martyr (a contribution to the disputes about the oath of supremacy and allegiance), and in 1611–13 with Ignatius his Conclave (an attack on the Jesuits), an Elegy on Prince Henry, and an Epithalamium for the marriage of Princess Elizabeth. In 1611 he travelled in Europe with Robert Drury, whose daughter he had already eulogized in the First Anniversary. In 1615 he was ordained in the Church of England, urged on by the King. In 1616 he became divinity reader of Lincoln's Inn with the responsibility of preaching there. From 1621 to his death he was dean of St Paul's, where he often preached before Charles I. He died of consumption and was buried in St Paul's.

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