The Sermons of John Donne, Volume IV

The Sermons of John Donne, Volume IV, marks his establishment as Dean of St. Pauls and his full entry into the central arena of Londons ecclesiastical and civic life. His sermons reflect the ceremonial rhythm of the Churchs year and the political turbulence of the 1620s, combining theological subtlety with a preachers responsiveness to the immediate anxieties of Londoners. They also reveal his deepening imaginative grasp of London itself as symbol and stage, with images drawn from the citys commerce, courts, and river. His Christmas sermons on Johns Gospel and Easter discourses on resurrection are among his most exalted works, uniting scholastic argument with lyrical metaphor.

Format: Hardback
Length: 430 pages
Publication date: 29 April 2022
Publisher: University of California Press

The Sermons of John Donne, edited by George R. Potter and Evelyn M. Simpson, Volume IV, marks Donne's establishment as Dean of St. Paul's and his full entry into the central arena of London's ecclesiastical and civic life. Preaching now in "Old St. Paul's," Donne found himself at the heart of England's capital, addressing not only cathedral congregations but also civic gatherings, court audiences, and public assemblies at Paul's Cross and the Spittle. The sermons of this volume vividly reflect both the ceremonial rhythm of the Church's year—Christmas, Easter, Whitsunday, and Candlemas—and the political turbulence of the 1620s, when the Palatinate crisis, the Spanish marriage negotiations, and King James's censorship of preaching weighed heavily on the national conscience. Donne's texts range widely: meditations on Christ as Light and Resurrection, urgent admonitions against Roman "idolatry," defenses of the Crown's Directions to Preachers, and visionary reflections on England's colonial project in Virginia. In all, Donne combined theological subtlety with a preacher's responsiveness to the immediate anxieties of Londoners, who listened to him as both spiritual guide and national voice. The volume also reveals Donne's deepening imaginative grasp of London itself as symbol and stage. His sermons abound in images drawn from the city's commerce, courts, and river: ships weathering storms, coins newly minted in Christ's image, and the Thames as both highway and metaphor of spiritual passage. Donne's appointment as Dean required him to preach at the great festivals, and his Christmas sermons on John's Gospel and Easter discourses on resurrection are among his most exalted works, uniting scholastic argument with lyrical metaphor. Yet the same volume includes "sermons upon emergent occasions," craft.

Weight: 798g
Dimension: 236 x 159 x 33 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780520372948