Death is but a Short Sleep

In John Donne’s poem “Death Be Not Proud,” a proper literary understanding of the word sleep is vital to the overall reading of this poem. The Oxford English Dictionary defines sleep in one entry as “The repose of death.” It is this definition that fits into this poem. The use of the word sleep in some ways alludes to death, but the word death is also used so they are used by the author as two distinct entities. Sleep is used to define death. The lines “From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,” and “One short sleep passed, we wake eternally,” both equate death to sleep (1031). Sleep is very docile and peaceful. It gives rest and recuperation. It creates unconsciousness and then we wake from it with renewed strength. This is the image that the author conjures in our minds about death as we read this poem. It brings us to a place where we do not fear death, but embrace it and look forward to it as we do to sleep.

This poem is an allegory that makes Death the central character. Without the use of allegory, this poem would have lost all of its impact because we would not be able to reconcile sleep and death together as well as the author did. It is because we view Death as a character that we are not only able to ascribe the qualities of sleep to “him,” but even replace the character Death with the character Sleep. Imagine if the author did not use the allusion of sleep? Would this story have had impact? I can hardly see how. It is precisely because the author compares death to sleep that we see death in a different light. It is because death is but the “One short sleep” that we face before eternity.


"sleep, n.". OED Online. November 2010. Oxford University Press. 9 February 2011 .

Donne, John. “Death Be Not Proud.” The Literary Experience. Ed. Beiderwell, Bruce and Jeffrey M. Wheeler. Boston: Thomson Wadsworth, 2008. 1031. Print.