This is my playes last scene...

1609
Subject Matter: the moment of death

Form: the sonnet

The voice: The persona in the poem conscious of his own mortality

Purpose to come to terms with the reality that with death comes fear and a sense of your own worth

Audience: the persona?God? a religious audience

Poem has an introspective, meditative solemnity to it repetition of my and last assert the finality and
urgency of this moment.

This is crushed by the description of GLUTTONOUS Death images of disembodiment are terrifying
and explore the personas fear at death and judgement

The octet of the sonnet establishes the sense of meditation and doubt and is countered in the
sestet

Sense of paradox idly and yet quickly run explores

Sin is a essentially physical in this poem and through argument and split between the physical and
the mental, body and soul Donne is able to find redemption.

Final lines in the poem – the rhyming couplet is a dying plea to God- there is a sense of immediacy in
the voice.. Impute at the beginning of the line gives emphasis as does the forceful verbs- press me
purg’d

The final line.. the world, the flesh , the devil.. emphasis his acceptance into heaven by
acknowledging his own sin . This brings peace and tranquillity.

What role does this poem play in the play Wit? Read page 34.
 At what stage of her journey is Vivian?
 How does Vivian’s state of mind reflect the concerns of the sonnet?
 What purpose does the sonnet form at this point in the performance?
If poisonous minerals