Rejecting the Pastoral Tradition

"The Bait" is a poem about erotic love, but it is also a poem about poetry. Its metapoetic elements derive from Donne's engagement with well-known poets and their work that preceded him, specifically Christopher Marlowe's "The Passionate Shepherd to his Love" and Sir Walter Raleigh's "The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd." These poems, written in 1599 and 1600, respectively, both become representatives of the poetic tradition that Donne rejects with "The Bait." In "The Passionate Shepherd to his Love," Marlowe uses the pastoral tradition to craft a seduction poem that idealizes the life of the poet (as shepherds were often considered metaphors for working poets during the early modern period). By crafting an idyllic setting in the natural world and encouraging the beloved to run away with him, the speaker of Marlowe's poem enacts the tropes of courtly love in order to win over his...