Scientific Discourse in John Donne’s Eschatological Poetry
Scientific Discourse in John Donne’s Eschatological Poetry offers a compelling critique of John Donne’s religious and erotic poetry, focusing on the intersection of two seemingly antithetical discourses: the language of the scientific revolution and of Christian eschatology. Throughout its three chapters, which correspond to three scientific disciplines – cartography, physics and alchemy – the volume examines the ways in which the references to early modern and medieval science in Donne’s poetry contribute to conceptualizing the Christian mystery of death.
Ludmiła Makuchowska holds a PhD from the University of Wrocław. Her scholarly interests include medieval and Renaissance verse, interdisciplinary studies of literature, and philosophical approaches to poetry.
“John Donne’s vivid scientific metaphors find in Ludmiła Makuchowska a sensitive interpreter, who coherently atomizes and anatomizes the symbolism within metaphysical poetry. With highly commendable consistency, Makuchowska demonstrates how the relationships between the different facets of science and poetic metaphysics translate to cultural and philosophical interconnections, including those between religion and science. In her study, Donne’s poetry ceases to be a portentous and idle compromise between the micro- and macrocosms or an unintelligible exercise of wit for rhetorical effect, enacted somewhere between the lens of a microscope and a telescope, but emerges as a more dramatic reflection on the titanic metaphysical struggles played out against the background of the 17th century scientific discoveries in geography, physics, and anatomy. The fresh approach, the interesting perspectives, and the penetrating analyses make this book an excellent contribution to New Historical studies.”
—Zbigniew Bialas, Professor of English Literature at the University of Silesia, Katowice, Poland
“Ludmiła Makuchowska’s interdisciplinary book – situated at the crossroads of not only literary studies, theology, and the visual arts, but also of the humanities and the sciences – is a consistent and disciplined inquiry into Donne’s epistemological skepticism: his exposition of the limitations of theological discourse by means of imagery derived from science, and the challenge his poetry poses to scientific rationalism through the paradoxes of the Christian faith. The undeniable value of this book lies in revealing in Donne’s poetry the presence of various elements of science, both Renaissance and scholastic, in the form of the stages of the scientific process, tools, laboratory equipment, methodology, and the structure of laws, and in demonstrating how these elements become integrated with Christian mysticism. The volume brings together analyses which are often innovative and compelling, and which add novel aspects to the understanding of Donne’s poems.”
—Barbara Kowalik, Professor of English Literature at the University of Warsaw, Poland
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