ENGLISH LITERATURE (CBSE/UGC NET)

Detailed explanation-1: -In his poem, ‘A Valediction Forbidding Mourning’, John Donne (1572–1631) uses the simile of ‘stiff twin compasses’ to describe two lovers who are physically parted, but united in their souls.

Detailed explanation-2: -In “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning, ” the speaker compares his soul and the soul of his beloved to a so-called twin compass. Also known as a draftsman’s compass, a twin compass has two legs, one that stays fixed and one that moves.

Detailed explanation-3: -In ‘A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning’, the relationship between two lovers who are shortly to be parted is compared to a pair of compasses: the legs of the compass may move apart, but they will always be joined together.

Detailed explanation-4: -“…his soul and his wife’s soul are like the two legs of a compass, permanently fixed by a pivot at one end…. Just as a compass has a fixed point, one leg that rotates on the same spot, so does Donne’s soul have a fixed point: his wife.”