John Donne’s is notoriously known in the literary world, as a man whose works were
misogynistic and sexual in regard to women. He has been debated and criticized on various
issues, since his poems pose problematic issues in the world, that today’s progressive world that
is slowly making way for women as equals, criticize and condemn. “The Flea” and “Air and
Angels” are some of his many works, published after his death that raises feminist problems that
were prevalent in the 16the and 17th century. Air and Angels is one poem that though beautifully
written, has underlying sexual connotations, abuse of the female body and treatment of the
woman as the “other”.
The poem is description of the speaker trying to woo a woman that he loves, even though he has
never spoken to her, but is assuredly in love. Donne uses the symbolic angel to represent the
spirit of the woman which is “shapeless” and has no form. The speaker wants to use the
shapeless form as a kind of blank page that he can fill it up with whatever he desires. In other
words, Donne is leaving the reader/listener to his imagination to picture the formless woman.
This takes away the full right of the woman’s body, who gets no say in what is being done to her
or how she is being viewed. In fact, in the entire poem, the speaker enforces his love upon her,
asking love, the child of the soul, to take up the body of the woman as its corporeal body. The
woman does not utter a single sound in the poem, submissive to the will of the speaker, even
when is overburdens her with his love, she does not complain or cry. The speaker is abusing the
body of the woman, imagining it to be what he wants it to look like, enforcing love upon her
without her consent, and making do whatever he wants with the woman’s body. He seems to
love the body rather than the person, because he has never talked to her, and he is instead
projecting all his fantasies and desires on to her. The female body in this poem is confined and
ignored, yet remains slightly and distinctly visible.
misogynistic and sexual in regard to women. He has been debated and criticized on various
issues, since his poems pose problematic issues in the world, that today’s progressive world that
is slowly making way for women as equals, criticize and condemn. “The Flea” and “Air and
Angels” are some of his many works, published after his death that raises feminist problems that
were prevalent in the 16the and 17th century. Air and Angels is one poem that though beautifully
written, has underlying sexual connotations, abuse of the female body and treatment of the
woman as the “other”.
The poem is description of the speaker trying to woo a woman that he loves, even though he has
never spoken to her, but is assuredly in love. Donne uses the symbolic angel to represent the
spirit of the woman which is “shapeless” and has no form. The speaker wants to use the
shapeless form as a kind of blank page that he can fill it up with whatever he desires. In other
words, Donne is leaving the reader/listener to his imagination to picture the formless woman.
This takes away the full right of the woman’s body, who gets no say in what is being done to her
or how she is being viewed. In fact, in the entire poem, the speaker enforces his love upon her,
asking love, the child of the soul, to take up the body of the woman as its corporeal body. The
woman does not utter a single sound in the poem, submissive to the will of the speaker, even
when is overburdens her with his love, she does not complain or cry. The speaker is abusing the
body of the woman, imagining it to be what he wants it to look like, enforcing love upon her
without her consent, and making do whatever he wants with the woman’s body. He seems to
love the body rather than the person, because he has never talked to her, and he is instead
projecting all his fantasies and desires on to her. The female body in this poem is confined and
ignored, yet remains slightly and distinctly visible.
