Try To Reconcile John Donne Poem With the Suicide of French Historian Dominique Venner

John Donne Never Met Mr. Venner

Here is the poem about mankind and death by John Donne, a poem where a few of the lines have gained immortality

No Man Is An Island

No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee. 

John Donne

And here is news about the suicide of a French historian in the Cathedral de Notre Dame in Paris.

 

A far-right French historian shot himself in the head beside the altar of Notre Dame cathedral in Paris . . .

Mr Venner, a presenter on a Catholic-traditionalust radio station and controversial historian and essayist,  posted an essay on his website earlier in the day calling for "new, spectacular and symbolic actions to shake us out of our sleep, to jolt anaesthetised minds and to reawaken memory of our origins".

Mr. Donne says we are supposed to be diminished by the death of Mr. Venner and that the bell that tolls his death tolls for us.  But consider this ask yourself if you are really diminished here.

Much of his work has been steeped in the racist ideology of the far-right, apologising for the pro-Hitler regime in Vichy in the Second World war and warning of conspiracies to destroy European civilisation and to swamp the white race.

 Mr Venner was also an expert, and the author of several books, on hunting and fire-arms. In the 1960s, he was a member of the Organisation de l'Armée Secrète - the extreme nationalist terrorist movement which opposed the French withdrawal from Algeria and attempted several times to assassinate President Charles de Gaulle.

Well, we will try to be diminished,  but no guarantees.  And it doesn't seem that in this case that the bell tolls for thee.