The Spectator’s Notes | 15 April 2006

On Good Friday 1613, John Donne found the direction of his journey on horseback in conflict with the duty of his soul. In his poem ‘Good Friday, 1613. Riding Westward’, Donne writes that ‘I am carried towards the West/ This day, when my soul’s form bends to the East’ (where the sun/Son will rise, and where Jesus was crucified). He says, though, that he prefers to face the other way, to avoid ‘That spectacle of too much weight for me’: it would be unbearable to see ‘The seat of all our souls …Made dirt of dust’. He imagines his back, as he rides, being regarded by Christ, turned towards Him to receive punishment. This allows Jesus to ‘Burn off my rust, and my deformity’. This done, ‘Thou may’st know me, and I’ll turn my face’. Did Donne literally make such a journey, or is that too post-Romantic a way of looking at his poem? I don’t know, but I have just bought a new horse, so I shall ride westwards on Good Friday 2006, and think about it.