DEATH BE NOT PROUD

1.      Identify and analyze the elements and devices in the poem, ‘Death, be not proud’

2.      Discuss the issues portrayed in the poem

3.      Analyze the poem

Summary of Content

Sonnet Forms	Rhyme Scheme
Italian or Petrarchan	abbaabba cde cde abbaabba cc dd ee abbaabba cdcd ee  abbaabba cddc aa
Spenserian	abab bcbc cdcd ee
English or Shakespearean	abab cdcd efef gg

Sonnet:

·         Petrarchan – 14 lines 3 quatrains and a couplet

·         The first 8 lines tells what Death thinks he is the the volta/turn/switch occurs in line 9 – the attack on Death, maybe to cover the speaker’s fear, tells what Death really is.

·         Iambic pentameter – ten accented beats in each line – a Holy Sonnet (religious)

·         Rhythm – moderate tempo to match the supposed confidence and cockiness of the speaker. It speeds up in the volta to enhance the attack on Death. It moves up and down looping at times to mimic the feelings of the speaker etc.

·         Death used as a metaphor but is personified – a bad boy, bully etc

·         The rhyme scheme and meter emphasize the mood and tone

The Speaker

Who is the speaker, can she or he read minds, and, more importantly, can we trust her or him?

The speaker of this poem finds himself in something like a David and Goliath situation. You might remember David from the Bible: he’s the skinny kid from Israel who takes down the biggest, meanest giant in the land with only a slingshot. The speaker doesn’t even have a slingshot – he only has his wit, or the ability to talk circles around his enemies. He’s got all the verbal tools: apostrophe, rhetorical questions, puns – the whole nine yards.

The speaker of the poem believes himself to be a good Christian, so he's confident he’ll eventually make it to Heaven. Even so, Death is nothing to sneeze at. The speaker sounds confident, even cocky, when he tells Death that he isn’t so "mighty and dreadful." But, despite this appearance, the speaker must be quaking in his boots. He has to summon all of his courage just to keep it together. If he shows any weakness, he knows that Death will pounce all over him.

By the time the poem takes a "turn" in line 9 (as any good Petrarchan sonnet will do), the speaker really lays into Death, calling him a slave and making fun of his friends. We imagine he’s right up in Death’s grill at this point, poking his finger in his chest. Fortunately, he ends the poem on a killer line about how Death will die. This probably leaves Death scratching his bony little head. And, as is always best to do when you tell off someone bigger than you, we imagine that the speaker doesn’t stick around for when Death finally comes to again. He gets the heck out of there.

Symbol Analysis

Death is a total poser in this poem, like a schoolyard bully who turns out not to be so tough, after all. The speaker even makes death out to be a good thing, because it leads to the new life of Christian eternity. Plus, everyone bosses Death around, from kings to suicidal people. Finally, a lot of the poem’s wit comes from combining literal and symbolic uses of the words "death" and die."

• Lines 1-2: This has got to be one of the most famous examples of personification and apostrophe in all of poetry. The speaker treats death like a person who is considered "mighty" and "dreadful," which is personification. And, he addresses this person-like Death directly, even though Death obviously can’t respond, which is apostrophe.
• Lines 3-4: Donne uses apostrophe again to address, "poor Death," which is an embarrassing and condescending way to talk to someone who considers himself a tough-guy.
• Lines 5-6: In this metaphor, he calls rest and sleep "pictures" of Death. They don’t have photographs in Donne’s age, so "pictures" just refers to imitations, like a drawing or a painting.
• Lines 7-8: Continuing the personification of Death, the speaker says that good people allow death to lead them out of their earthly lives. The bones of the "best men" are a synecdoche, because they actually stand for the whole physical body. Line 8, then, draws a standard religious contrast between body and soul.
• Line 12: We often talk about people who "swell" with pride, and that’s what’s going on here, when the speaker asks, "Why swell’st thou then?" This is a rhetorical question, designed to make Death realize that he has no reason to be proud.
• Line 14: He uses the concept of death three ways in this tricky line. First, there is real, physical death (the second word of the line). Then, there is the personified idea of Death. Finally, there is death as a metaphor for simple non-existence – something that ceases to be there – which the last word "die" references.

Rest and Sleep

Donne didn’t invent the comparison between death and sleep, but he uses it here to great effect. But, you have to know a tiny bit of Christian theology to fully understand the idea. It is thought that, when faithful Christians die, they are only "dead" until the Day of Judgment comes and Christ returns to Earth. They compare this length of time to a period of "sleep." At this point, time ends, eternity begins, and all the faithful Christians who died will "wake up" to be led into Heaven. At this point, all their earthly troubles are over for good, and they will be at "rest" with God.

• Line 5: This metaphor compares "rest" and "sleep" to "pictures," like a painting or drawing. The point is that the rest and sleep are pale imitations, and Death is the real thing. On the other hand, Death is only a much stronger version of sleep, and not something scary and different.
• Line 8: This line describes what the experience of death means to the "best men" of line 7. One of its meanings is eternal rest for their weary bodies, or "bones."
• Line 11: The comparison between Death and sleep becomes an extended metaphor at this point. The speaker says that, if he only wants a really good sleep, he doesn’t even need Death; he can use "poppies" (opium, a kind of drug) or "charms" (magic or potions).
• Line 13: The extended metaphor continues. He calls the time between the speaker’s death and the Day of Judgment a "short sleep." In human terms, this may not seem that short (we can assume the speaker is "asleep" for hundreds of years already), but, compared to Eternity, pretty much anything is short. When the speaker "wakes up," he will find himself in Heaven.

Death's Friends and Masters

Death hangs out with a bad crowd, like the kids who hang out behind the bleachers and try to talk you into vandalizing things on Halloween. Unfortunately, they aren’t cool at all. They’re big losers, in fact, and Death knows it – which is why it’s such an insult when the speaker points out Death’s connection to poison, war, and sickness. And, that’s not all. Death – this big strong guy – isn’t even his own master! All these other people tell him what to do. It’s like when you learn that the bully who torments you at school actually has his own bullies in the next grade up. It may not prevent your daily beatings, but it makes you feel a whole lot better about it.

• Line 9: This metaphor calls Death a "slave" to "fate, chance, kings, and desperate men." Implicitly, all these things are personified as Death’s master.
• Line 10: Although it’s not as obvious as in other parts of the poem, we think "poison, war, and sickness" are personified as thugs, or worthless individuals.

Birth

There’s only one example, and it’s a play on words, but we wanted to give Birth a little love, too, because it’s nothing but Death, Death, Death for most of the poem.

• Line 8: It’s a pun! Sweet! To "deliver" someone can mean to set them free, as in the Lord’s Prayer: "Deliver us from evil...." But, the speaker also wants to be "delivered" into the afterlife, like a baby is "delivered" into the world during birth. The comparison of death to rebirth is such a common metaphor that we rarely even think of it as a being a metaphor.