The Devotional Poetry of Donne, Herbert, and Milton

Get everything you can out of your time reading the classics with the Christian Guides to the Classics Series!

Leland Ryken provides a clear pathway to understanding the "Great Works" through this engaging series of short guidebooks. Beginning with "why the classics matter" and "the nature and function of literature," readers will find a helpful path to reading and analyzing influential works in the Western canon. Evaluating the included selection of poetry from a distinctly Christian perspective, this guide to the devotional poetry of Donne, Herbert, and Milton includes commentary on the work, including Scriptural allusions, and provides prompts for reflection and discussion.

Each book:

Includes an introduction to the author and work

Explains the cultural context

Incorporates published criticism

Defines key literary terms

Contains discussion questions at the end of each unit of the text

Lists resources for further study

Evaluates the classic text from a Christian worldview.

This volume leads readers through the devotional poetry of three seventeenth-century poetic geniuses: John Donne, George Herbert, and John Milton.

1. Opening Credits
2. Lyric Poems as Classics
3. Lyric Poems as a Genre
4. A Guide to Explicating Poetry
5. The Sonnet as a Verse Form
6. How Metaphor, Simile, and Allusion Work
7. The Content and Format of This Guide
8. John Donne and His Poetry
9. Holy Sonnet 1: Thou Hast Made Me
10. Holy Sonnet 2: As Due by Many Titles I Resign
11. Holy Sonnet 4: O My Black Soul
12. Holy Sonnet 6: This Is My Play’s Last Scene
13. Holy Sonnet 7: At the Round Earth’s Imagined Corners
14. Holy Sonnet 10: Death Be Not Proud
15. Holy Sonnet 11: Spit in My Face You Jews
16. Holy Sonnet 14: Batter My Heart
17. Holy Sonnet 15: Wilt Thou Love God as He Thee
18. Meditation Seventeen From Devotions
19. From Sermon 7
20. George Herbert and His Poetry
21. Aaron
22. Redemption
23. Prayer
24. Virtue
25. The Pulley
26. The Agony
27. Love (III)
28. The Elixir
29. Easter (Song)
30. The Collar
31. John Milton and His Sonnets
32. Sonnet 7: How Soon Hath Time
33. Sonnet 9: Lady That in the Prime of Earliest Youth
34. Sonnet 14: When Faith and Love
35. Sonnet 19: When I Consider How My Light Is Spent
36. Sonnet 23: Methought I Saw My Late Espouséd Saint
37. Closing Credits