Two suggested sources for Donne's Holy sonnets: a religious sonnet sequence.

Abstract

The end of the sixteenth century encounters a growing tide that is stemming the highly popular form of Elizabethan courtly love poetry, creating a poetry with a central theme of divine love. The poetry of Fulke Greville and Robert Southwell exhibits transitional characteristics that suggest possible sources for some of Donne's religious verse. This study investigates some distinctive similarities between their work and Donne's in an effort to make clear the transition that occurs between the courtly tradition and the metaphysical poetry of the seventeenth century.