Description: Although John Donne enjoyed a reputation as a «visitor of ladies» during his lifetime, the poetry that he left in manuscript can lead modern readers to doubt that the objects of his affections were always women. Klawitter's study contends that, in Donne's later poems that have traditionally been read as heterosexual expressions of love, readers can find themselves lost in a welter of pronouns that, often insufficiently determinate of gender, can fit convincingly in a homoerotic context.
Review Quotes: «Klawitter's book is a contribution to the critical project of Renaissance gender studies. 'The Enigmatic Narrator' is bound to have an impact on Donne studies. Claiming for Donne's poetry a new element - the narrator's tender feelings for men - it challenges the way Donne has been read in the past.» (Diana Treviño Benet, New York University).
«'The Enigmatic Narrator' is a courageous book, providing a cogent recontextualization of Donne's secular poetry amid the discourse of same-sex male love. Reading the poems liberated from heterosexual presuppositions, Klawitter offers the most sustained and compelling account available of Donne's verse letters to his male friends. No one who has read this provocative book will be able to read Donne's erotic poems in the exclusively heterosexual context that traditional criticism has provided. With this book, Klawitter assumes an important position in the current project of reinterpreting Renaissance literature through the lenses made available by gay studies.» (Michael Schoenfeldt, The University of Michigan)
«Admirers of Donne's poetry will want to obtain this book.» (John Lauritsen, The James White Review)