Effective Use of Conceit and Imagery in Donne's Poem The Broken Heart

686 Words2 Pages

Throughout John Donne’s extensive range of poems, his use of metaphors and imagery remains unparalleled. He consistently uses conceit and makes fascinating connections while creating unique set of imagery. Specifically in his poem The Broken Heart, Donne takes the idea that love breaks the heart and personifies and imagines this image. While some scholars believe that John Donne makes mediocre claims in his writing, he does however effectively use conceit and imagery to successfully argue his idea that love destroys the heart.

In the poem, Donne structures each stanza individually as a different personification of love. In the first stanza, Donne compares love to a plague when he says, “Yet not that love so soon decays…that I have had the plague…” (3/6) It is the latter line that Donne implements his use of imagery and conceit. Love is not often compared with “the plague” and this is a very strong interpretation. However while these two images seem different, they do interconnect through the pain and anguish that love can foster. This first comparison of Donne’s is very ef...

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