To His Mistress Going to Bed

Essay Questions

1. *How does Donne use the metaphysical conceit of geographical exploration in To His Mistress Going to Bed to transform physical desire into an act of intellectual discovery? Consider how the extended comparison of the mistress's body to an uncharted continent shapes the speaker's portrayal of intimacy, and evaluate how effectively this conceit sustains the poem's central argument. (AQA AO2; AP Lit Q1 poetry analysis; IB guiding concept: Transformation)*

1. *To what extent does Donne present the act of undressing as a form of spiritual liberation rather than mere physical seduction in To His Mistress Going to Bed? In your response, explore how the poem's religious imagery — including the angels in white robes and the sacred temple of the bed — blurs the boundary between the erotic and the divine. (AQA AO1/AO2; IB guiding concept: Identity)*

1. *How does Donne construct a rhetorically persuasive speaker in To His Mistress Going to Bed, and to what extent does the poem's wit and logical playfulness undermine or reinforce the sincerity of the speaker's desire? Consider the role of paradox, theological jokes, and tonal warmth — including the vulnerability revealed in the poem's closing movement — in shaping the reader's response to the speaker's voice. (AQA AO1/AO2; AP Lit Q1 poetry analysis)*

1. *To what extent does To His Mistress Going to Bed reflect the values and anxieties of its Elizabethan context? Explore how Donne draws on the Ovidian tradition, the Age of Exploration, and Renaissance ideals of wit and ambition to produce a poem that is simultaneously conventional and daringly original. (AQA AO3; IB guiding concept: Context)*

1. *How does Donne use the symbolism of clothing and nakedness in To His Mistress Going to Bed to develop a sustained argument about authenticity, identity, and the relationship between outward appearance and inner truth? In your answer, consider the mystic book symbol and the poem's closing gesture, in which the speaker's own disrobing becomes the logical climax of his argument. (AQA AO1/AO2; AP Lit Q1 poetry analysis; IB guiding concept: Identity)*

1. Compare how two poems from your wider reading present physical desire as a form of power or persuasion. In your response, consider how Donne's confident, witty speaker in To His Mistress Going to Bed uses wit, metaphor, and logical argumentation as instruments of seduction, and how a second poem of your choice similarly or differently constructs desire as a rhetorical act. (AQA AO1/AO2/AO3 comparative; IB guiding concept: Power)

1. *How does Donne's use of multiple symbolic registers — religious, mythological, and geographical — in To His Mistress Going to Bed contribute to the poem's overall vision of love as something that simultaneously elevates and liberates? Evaluate whether the poem ultimately presents love as an act of mutual freedom or as an exercise of the speaker's intellectual dominance. (AQA AO1/AO2; AP Lit Q1 poetry analysis; IB guiding concepts: Freedom, Love)*