Donne in Popular Culture
- John Renbourn, on his 1966 debut album John Renbourn, sings a version of the poem, "Song: Go and Catch a Falling Star". (He alters the last line to "False, ere I count one, two, three.")
- Tarwater, in their album Salon des Refusés, have put "The Relic" to song.
- The plot of Neil Gaiman's novel Stardust is based upon the poem "Song: Go and Catch a Falling Star," with the fallen star turned into a major character.
- One of the major plotlines of Diana Wynne Jones' novel Howl's Moving Castle is based upon the poem "Song: Go and Catch a Falling Star," with each of the lines in the poem coming true or being fulfilled by the main male character.
- Bob Chilcott has arranged a choral piece to Donne's "Go and Catch a Falling Star".
- Van Morrison pays tribute to the poet in "Rave On John Donne" from his album "Poetic Champions Compose" and makes references in many other songs.
- Lost in Austen, the British mini series based on Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, has Bingley refer to Donne when he describes taking Jane to America, "John Donne, don't you know? 'License my roving hands,' and so forth."
- Las Cruces, in their album Ringmaster, used a sample of "Death be not Proud" from the movie The Exorcist III for their song "Black Waters".
- In the beginning of the movie About a Boy, the quiz show mentions 'No man is an island', asking the competitors who coined the phrase. John Donne is one of the answers and is of course, the correct answer. Hugh Grant, the main character, turns on the TV before viewers are given the answer, and he himself answers the question incorrectly.
- In the computer game The Walking Dead, one of the side characters, Chuck, uses the quote "Ask not for whom the bell tolls, for it tolls for thee" from Donne's poem 'No man is an island', before the group is overrun by walkers.
Read more about this topic: John Donne
Famous quotes containing the words donne, popular and/or culture:
“Whensoever any affliction assails me, mee thinks I have the keyes of my prison in mine owne hand, and no remedy presents it selfe so soone to my heart, as mine own sword. Often meditation of this hath wonne me to a charitable interpretation of their action, who dy so: and provoked me a little to watch and exagitate their reasons, which pronounce so peremptory judgements upon them.”
—John Donne (c. 1572–1631)
“Both gossip and joking are intrinsically valuable activities. Both are essentially social activities that strengthen interpersonal bonds—we do not tell jokes and gossip to ourselves. As popular activities that evade social restrictions, they often refer to topics that are inaccessible to serious public discussion. Gossip and joking often appear together: when we gossip we usually tell jokes and when we are joking we often gossip as well.”
—Aaron Ben-Ze’Ev, Israeli philosopher. “The Vindication of Gossip,” Good Gossip, University Press of Kansas (1994)
“Culture is the suggestion, from certain best thoughts, that a man has a range of affinities through which he can modulate the violence of any master-tones that have a droning preponderance in his scale, and succor him against himself. Culture redresses this imbalance, puts him among equals and superiors, revives the delicious sense of sympathy, and warns him of the dangers of solitude and repulsion.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)