The primary character in this poem is the speaker. The speaker is the person from whose perspective the poem is narrated. Many of Donne’s speakers are read as autobiographical characters – as representative of the poet’s own perspective, due to the similarity between the themes of the poem and the topics Donne wrote about in his journals and letters. This narrator is also primarily characterized as a poet. He describes himself, facetiously if not entirely insincerely, as a “fool” (1). The speaker is nonetheless clearly an intelligent character, with a rich vocabulary and insightful observations about his own painful experiences.