An Expression of the Soul

John Donne Journal 31, 2012

sbe.dpu.edu.tr

This textbook provides BA-level students with an introduction to the literary historical issues relevant to English Renaissance poetry. The textbook focuses notably on Renaissance love sonnets (Wyatt, Spenser, Sidney, Shakespeare) and on metaphysical poetry.

This two-part exploratory essay identifies Kabbalistic contexts, motivations, and themes in John Donne's Metempsychosis, including an explication of the stanza form and allusions to the Sefirot, Kabbalistic understandings of gilgul or transmigration, the Shekhinah or indwelling of God, and Kabbalistic hermeneutical principles. It also suggests the relevance of Donne's religious identity to his choice of imagery, and his skeptical attitude to the extravagant claims of the Christian Kabbalists. *Author’s Note (2018)*: This is a draft that became my article Conceiving Bodies, Intertextuality, and Censorship in Metempsychosis (John Donne Journal 31, 2012). The JDJ was not particularly convinced by the discussion of Kabbalah, and this element was abandoned in favour of a deeper analysis of the poem’s structure and a more contextual interpretation. On rereading this draft years later, I would reframe many things and retract some of the interpretive claims. However, having left the academy and lacking the time to revise or pursue publication, I leave this as ground work for others interested in Kabbalistic motivations and ideas in Donne’s poem.