The anatomy of the conceit in John Donne's songs and sonnets

This thesis has been a study of the conceit as employed in the Songs and Sonnets of John Donne. It has suggested that the difficulty encountered in attempted classification of Donne's love-poetry may be partially resolved by a recognition of various voices or personae in the poems, several of which may be present within an individual poem. It has demonstrated the way in which Donne's employment of the conceit enabled him to express this variety of voices or personae simultaneously as they exchange positions of dominance and submissiveness within a poem.The thesis has illustrated its study of the conceit through the explication of four specific poems: "The Ecstasy," "A Valediction: forbidding mourning," "The Canonization," and "Love's Alchemy."Thesis (M.A.