THE GEOMETRY OF THE SELF – CIRCULAR IMAGERY, DISLOCATION AND INNER SPACE IN DONNE AND „THE WINDMILLS OF YOUR MIND“

Nasleđe 63 (2026) [149-158]

AUTOR(I) / AUTHOR(S): Jovana D. Jovac

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.46793/NasKg2663.149J

SAŽETAK /ABSTRACT:

This paper explores the evolution of circular imagery from Renaissance metaphysical poetry to postmodern lyricism, through a reading of John Donne’s A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning and The Sunne Rising, and Michel Legrand’s The Windmills of Your Mind. The analysis examines how spatial metaphors align with concepts of identity, love and order and is written within the ontological and philosophical frameworks of Neoplatonism and the cultural and psychological discourses of postmodernism. Whereas the circle in Donne’s work represents spiritual and physical unity, love and cosmic order, in The Windmills of Your Mind it becomes symbolic of mental recursion, fragmentation and existential dislocation. This change reflects a cultural transition from external metaphysical coherence to internal psychological uncertainty, and mirrors a larger ontological shift in the perception of selfhood, love and reality.

KLJUČNE REČI / KEYWORDS: 

John Donne, circular imagery, postmodern self, dislocation, spatial metaphors, The Windmills of Your Mind, comparative literature

PROJEKAT / ACKNOWLEDGEMENT:

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