num_pages: 592
description: John Donne's life story is inextricably tied up with the fabric of a society in the throes of religious persecution. His family had long been subject to the terror inflicted upon Catholics under the reign of Elizabeth I, and while his brother languished in prison, and his mother and uncles fled to exile in Europe, Donne was consumed by the question of his own faith and by trying to figure out what it is that connects human beings - and keeps them apart.In his biography of Donne, John Stubbs chronicles not only a long and bitter sectarian conflict, but also the love story of a young couple who broke the rules of their society, and paid the ultimate price.From the raucous streets of late sixteenth-century London to the personal and political intrigues of Donne's family and public life, from the horrors of the Reformation to the delight of Donne's poetry, John Stubbs' book is a vivid, dazzling biography of an extraordinary man, as well as a compelling portrait of England at a time of bewildering transformation."Rich, generous and capacious....Its triumph is to show how the brilliant, abrasive, phenomenally direct voice of the Songs and Sonnets...deepens and darkens, cracking sometimes under the harsh strain of his middle years, only to re-emerge in the humane and powerful sermons of his last decade."Hilary Spurling, Observer"Highly readable...Stubbs manages to make Donne seem recognizable and sympathetic, and also the inhabitant of a world that has long since disappeared."Andrew Motion, Guardian
language: English
title: Donne: The Reformed Soul
titlecomplete: Donne: The Reformed Soul
genres: Biography, Poetry, British Literature, Nonfiction, Classics, Biography Memoir, History, Literary Criticism
ratings_count: 268
awards: awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Guardian First Book Award
category: Longlist, awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Costa Book Award
category: Biography, awardedAt: 1072944000000
name: RSL Jerwood Award
publisher: Penguin Books Ltd