Rev. John Donne

The son of a London citizen, John Donne was raised in a Catholic family. He matriculated at Hart Hall Oxford in 1584 at the age of 11 (created M.A. in 1610) from whence he entered Lincoln's Inn in 1592, and participated in the Cadiz expedition of 1596-97. Donne was secretary to Sir Thomas Egerton from 1596 to 1601, when his ambitions were thwarted by his secret marriage to Anne More. Turning from satire and lyric to sacred and epideictic writings, Donne sought patronage at court. He was ordained in 1615 and appointed dean of St. Paul's in 1622.

TEXT RECORDS:

1613An Epithalamion, or Mariage Song on the Lady Elizabeth, and Count Palatine being married on St. Valentines Day.
1613Ecclogue. 1613. December 26.
1613 ca.Epithalamion made at Lincolnes Inne.

PUBLICATIONS:

Pseudo-martyr. 1610.
Ignatius his Conclave. 1611.
An anatomy of the world. 1611.
The second anniversary: of the progress of the soule. 1612.
Three sermons. 1623.
Devotions upon emergent occasions. 1624.
Four sermons. 1625.
Five sermons. 1625.
Death's duell. 1632.
Juvenilia: or certaine paradoxes and problems. 1633.
Poems. 1633.
Biathanatos. 1646.
Essayes in divinity. 1651.
Letters to severall persons of honour, ed. John Donne, Jr. 1651.
Pardoxes, problems, and characters, with Ignatius his conclave. 1652.
Poems. 1719.
Sermons, ed. G. R. Potter and Evelyn M. Simpson. 10 vols, 1953-62.
Poems, ed. H. . C. Grierson. 2 vols, 1912.
Divine poems, ed. Helen Gardner. 1952, 1978.
Elegies, songs, and sonnets, ed. Helen Gardner. 1952, 1978.
Satires, epigrams, and verse letters, ed. W. Milgate. 1967.
The anniversaries, epithalamions, and epicides, ed. W. Milgate. 1978.

PROFILE AND
ASSOCIATES:

English
Catholic
Anglican
Dissenter

Hart Hall Oxford
Lincoln's Inn
Inns of Court
courtier
Dean of St. Paul's

clergyman
secretary
poet
essayist

Edward Alleyn
Thomas Beedome
Christopher Brooke
Thomas Carew
Robert Cotton
Sir John Davies
John Davies of Hereford
Michael Drayton
Thomas Freeman
Sir Henry Goodere
Edward Guilpin
Bp. Joseph Hall
Herbert of Cherbury
William Herbert
John Hoskyns
Ben Jonson
Henry King
Endymion Porter
Sir John Roe
Izaak Walton
Henry Wotton
Countess of Bedford
Countess of Pembroke
Earl of Essex

REFERENCE:

DNB; NCBEL; DLB.

Isaak Walton, The Life of Donne (1640); Thomas Fuller, Worthies of England (1662); Edward Phillips, Theatrum Poetarum (1675); William Winstanley, Lives of the Most Famous English Poets (1687); Anthony Wood, Athenae Oxonienses (1690-91; 1721); Blount, De re poetica (1694); Giles Jacob, An Historical Account of ... English Poets (1720); Biographia Britannica (1747-66); Cibber-Shiels, Lives of the Poets (1753); "Life of John Donne" Christian's Magazine 5 (September-October 1764) 388-95, 436-43 [portrait]; "Life of John Donne" Universal Magazine 56 (February 1775) 62-65; Bell's Poets of Great Britain (1776-82); "Life of Donne" [by Walton] Arminian Magazine 2 (August, September 1779); George Ellis, Specimens of Early English Poetry (1790; 1801); Robert Anderson, British Poets (1795); "Life of Donne" Port Folio [Philadelphia] NS 1 (18 January 1806) 21-24 [from Anderson]; Peter L. Courtier, ed., Lyre of Love (1806); "Dr. Donne's Monument" Gentleman's Magazine 78 (December 1808) 1073-74; Alexander Chalmers, English Poets (1810); "Remarks on the Poetry of Donne" European Magazine 62 (October 1812) 264; Alexander Chalmers, General Biographical Dictionary (1812-17); Bliss, Athenae Oxonienses (1815); Nathan Drake, in Shakespeare and his Times (1817; 1838); Thomas Campbell, Specimens of the British Poets (1819); Ezekiel Sanford, British Poets (1819); "On the Genius of Cowley, Donne, and Cleveland" European Magazine 82 (July-August 1822) 44-48, 108-12; Retrospective Review 8 (1823) 31-55; Robert Watt, Bibliotheca Britannica (1824); Anna Brownell Jameson, Loves of the Poets (1829); Robert Southey, British Poets, Chaucer to Jonson (1831); Richard Cattermole, Sacred Poetry of the Seventeenth Century (1836); Robert Chambers, Cyclopaedia of English Literature (1844); Edward Farr, Select Poetry, chiefly sacred, of the Reign of King James the First (1847); Allibone, Critical Dictionary of English Literature (1858-71; 1882); Thomas Corser, Collectanea Anglo-Poetica 5 (1873) 219-32; The English Poets, ed. Thomas Humphry Ward (1880); Foster, Alumni Oxon (1887-91); Leslie Stephen, "Johne Donne" The National Review 34 (1899); Moulton, Library of Literary Criticism (1901-05); Lewis, OHEL (1954); Bush, OHEL (1945); R. C. Bald, Donne, a Life (1970); A. J. Smith, John Donne: The Critical Heritage (1975); John Carey, John Donne: Life, Mind, and Art (1980); Mark Eccles, "Brief Lives" Studies in Philology 79 (1982); Saunders, Renaissance Poets (1983); Spenser Encyclopedia, "Donne" (1990) 221-22; Chadwyck-Healey English Poetry Database (1995).

COMMENTARY RECORDS
for Rev. John Donne:

1.	1602  John Manningham, December 1602 ; in Diary, ed. Bruce (1868) 99.
2.	1611 ca.  John Davies of Hereford, "To the no less ingenious then ingenuous Mr. John Dun" Scourge of Folly, 1611 ca.; Davies, Works, ed. Grosart (1878) 2:18.
3.	1614  Thomas Freeman, "To John Dunne" in Rubbe, and a Great Cast. Epigrams" (1614) sigs K1v-K2.
4.	1616  Ben Jonson, "To John Donne" Jonson, Workes (1616) 775.
5.	1616  Ben Jonson, "To John Donne" Jonson, Workes (1616) 797.
6.	1619  Ben Jonson, Conversation with Drummond, 1619; Drummond, Works (1711) 225.
7.	1633  Henry King, "To the Memorie of my ever desired Friend Dr. Donne" Donne, Poems (1633) 373-75.
8.	1633  Thomas Browne, "To the deceased Author, upon the promiscuous printing of his Poems, the looser Sort, with the Religious" Donne, Poems (1633) 376.
9.	1633  Edward Hyde, "On the Death of Dr. Donne" Donne, Poems (1633) 377.
10.	1633  Richard Corbet, "On Dr. Donn" Donne, Poems (1633) 378.
11.	1633  Izaak Walton, "An Elegie upon Dr. Donne" Donne, Poems (1633) 382-84.
12.	1633  Endymion Porter, "Epitaph upon Dr. Donne" Donne, Poems (1633) 404-05.
13.	1638  Nathaniel Whiting, in "Il Insonio Insonnadado" Le Hore de Recreatione (1638) sig. H6v.
14.	1639  Thomas Bancroft, "To Doctor Donne" Two Bookes of Epigrammes, and Epitaphs (1639) sig. D3.
15.	1640  Izaac Walton, in Life of Dr. Donne (1640); Walton's Lives, ed. Zouch (1865) 92-93.
16.	1640 ca.  Thomas Beedome, "To the Memory of his honoured Friend Master John Donne, an Eversary" Beedome, Poems (1641) sigs G7-G8v.
17.	1646  George Daniel of Beswick, in "Vindication of Poesie" 1646; Poems, ed. Grosart (1878) 1:29.
18.	1673  Charles Cotton, "To my old and most worthy Friend Mr. Izaak Walton, on his Life of Dr. Donne, etc." 1673; Cotton, Poems (1923) 113-17.
19.	1693  John Dryden, in Of the Original and Progress of Satire (1693); Of Dramatic Poesy and other Essays, ed. Watson (1962) 2:144.
20.	1697  William Walsh, in Preface to Letters and Poems (1697) sigs A4v-A5.
21.	1734  Alexander Pope, 1734-36 ca.; in Spence, Anecdotes, Observations, and Characters ed. Singer (1820) 136.
22.	1750  Thomas Gray, "Observations on English Meter" (MS.) in Works, ed. Gosse (1895) 1:340-41 & n.
23.	1775  Anonymous, in "Life of John Donne" Universal Magazine 56 (February 1775) 64-65.
24.	1779  Vicesimus Knox, in Essays Moral and Literary (1779) 2:151.
25.	1781  Frederica B— A—, "To the Docter Himself" Edinburgh Magazine or Literary Amusement 54 (25 October 1781) 85.
26.	1781  Belinda, "Answer to the Lines in the St. J. Chronicle of Thursday last, from Dr. Donne" St. James's Chronicle (20 October 1781).
27.	1782  Joseph Warton, in Essay on the Genius and Writings of Pope (1782) 2:353-55.
28.	1789  Edmond Malone, 1789; Maloniana, in Sir James Prior, Edmond Malone (1860) 396.
29.	1789  Anonymous, in The Grove of Fancy (1789) 26-27.
30.	1795  Robert Anderson, in Works of the British Poets (1795) 4:4-5.
31.	1800  Nathan Drake, in Literary Hours (1800) 2:170.
32.	1801  Henry Kirke White, "Melancholy Hours X" 1801; Works (1869) 437.
33.	1806  Peter L. Courtier, in Lyre of Love (1806) 1:19.
34.	1806  Joseph Dennie, "Headnote to Life of John Donne" Port Folio [Philadelphia] NS 1 (18 January 1806) 21.
35.	1808  Anonymous, "Dr. Donne" The Monthly Magazine 25 (May 1808) 331-32.
36.	1808  Anonymous, "Dr. Donne" Monthly Anthology [Boston] 5 (April 1808) 208-09.
37.	1815  Samuel Egerton Brydges, in Restituta or ... English Literature Revived 2 (1815) 10.
38.	1818  William Hazlitt, in Lectures on the English Poets (1818; 1909) 109.
39.	1819  Leigh Hunt to Percy and Mary Shelley, 20 September 1819; Correspondence of Leigh Hunt (1862) 1:149.
40.	1820  John Payne Collier, in Poetical Decameron (1820) 1:155.
41.	1820  Anonymous, in "On the Progressive Change of Poetical Style" Blackwood's Magazine 6 (January 1820) 368.
42.	1820  Anonymous, "The Hive: Anecdote of John Donne" European Magazine 77 (May 1820) 405.
43.	1823  Anonymous, in Retrospective Review 8 (1823) 31.
44.	1824  Bryan Waller Procter, in Effigies Poeticae, or, the Portraits of the British Poets (1824) 23.
45.	1827  Henry Neele, in Russell Institution Lectures on English Poetry (1827); Remains (New York, 1829) 117.
46.	1829  Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1825 ca.; Coleridge on the Seventeenth Century (1955) 526.
47.	1829  Anna Brownell Jameson, "Story of Dr. Donne and his Wife" Loves of the Poets (1829; 1857) 327-38.
48.	1831  Robert Southey, in British Poets, Chaucer to Jonson (1831) 714.
49.	1834  Robert Aris Willmott, in English Sacred Poets (1834; 1839) 1:278-79.
50.	1836  Richard Cattermole, in Sacred Poetry of the Seventeenth Century (1836) 2:53.
51.	1837  Henry Hallam, in Introduction to the Literature of Europe of the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Seventeenth Centuries (1837-39; 1882) 3:248.
52.	1847  Edward Farr, in Select Poetry, chiefly sacred, of the Reign of King James the First (1847) xii.
53.	1859  David Masson, in Life of John Milton (1859-94; 1965) 1:489.
54.	1860  George Gilfillan, in Specimens with Memoirs of the less-known British Poets (1860) 1:201-04.
55.	1880  John W. Hales, in The English Poets: Selections with Critical Introductions, ed. Thomas Humphry Ward (1880) 1:558-60.
56.	1882  Epes Sargent, in Harper's Cyclopaedia of British and American Poetry (1882) 41-42.

BIOGRAPHY RECORDS
for Rev. John Donne:

1.	1662  Thomas Fuller, in History of the Worthies of England (1662) 2:221.
2.	1675  Edward Phillips, in Theatrum Poetarum (1675) 2:106-07.
3.	1687  William Winstanley, Lives of the Most Famous English Poets (1687) 117-21.
4.	1690  Anthony Wood, Athenae Oxonienses (1690-91; 1721) 1:554-56.
5.	1720  Giles Jacob, in Historical Account of the Lives and Writings of our most considerable English Poets (1720) 46-48.
6.	1753  Anonymous, in Cibber-Shiels, Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) 1:202-09.
7.	1769  James Granger, in Biographical History of England (1769; 1824) 2:60.
8.	1812  Alexander Chalmers, in General Biographical Dictionary (1812-17) 12:247-62.
9.	1817  Nathan Drake, in Shakespeare and his Times (1817; 1838) 298.
10.	1819  Thomas Campbell, in Specimens of the British Poets (1819; 1845) 124-25.
11.	1831  Robert Southey, "John Donne" in British Poets, Chaucer to Jonson (1831) 714.
12.	1844  Robert Chambers, in Cyclopaedia of English Literature (1844; 1850) 1:109-10.

AUTHOR AS CRITIC:
(commentary records)

1.	1605 ca.  Sir Henry Goodere:   John Donne, "To Sir Henry Goodyere" 1605 ca.; Donne, Poems (1633) 72-74.