1. What do the speakers have in common in the sonnets "Whoso List to Hunt" by Sir Thomas Wyatt and "Sonnet 30" by Edmund Spenser? How are they different? Consider the focus of the speaker in each work.

2. Explain the extended metaphor in Jonson's "Song: To Celia."

3. Explain the metaphor of the compass in Donne's "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning."

4. Explain Satan's opinions about God. Do they seem logical?

1. Both speakers are in love with unavailable women, or at least women who don’t love them back. In Wyatt’s sonnet, the speaker is obviously a man who has pursued his beloved for long, but she is ultimately unattainable because she belongs to another man (referred to as Caesar). Both speakers can’t have a woman they love, and their yearning increases, the lesser the chance of fulfilling it is. However, in Spenser’s sonnet, this yearning is a bit more metaphysical, as he doesn’t talk in sexual and predatory terms (hunting); his focus is on passion vs. coldness dynamics, and not on the physical availability of the beloved.

2. The extended metaphor in this short poem is drinking, as well as the thirst it quenches (or fails to quench, for that matter). Basically, a metaphor says one thing, while referring to another in its stead. Here, drinking is a metaphor of love and physical, erotic desire that Celia has awoken with the speaker. Celia’s breath and kiss, if only left on a glass, is more precious than wine or even Jove’s (Jupiter’s) nectar. The speaker is aware than she doesn’t love him back, but he keeps yearning for her.

3. The metaphor of the compass in this poem is one of those weird and even bizarre metaphors that Donne is famous for. It is a way of comparing his love to his wife with a mechanical thing that doesn’t depend on trivial matters. It works according to laws of nature, and doesn’t require any kind of superficial recognition by the society. In other words, physical separation can’t hurt their love. It works and always will work.

4. I'm assuming this is about "Paradise Lost". Satan refers to God as some kind of tyrant who can’t stand opposition or different thinking. In Satan’s view, God is basically an enemy of democracy, who is really hooked on power and wishes everything and everybody to be his slaves and subjects. However, Satan’s opinions are later undermined, because the speaker shows us the causes of Satan’s rebellion against God - and they are personal and egotistical. Satan is just resentful and angry for losing the battle, and is using all his rhetorical strengths to turn the situation in his own favor.