The Canonization in the context of Cleanth Brooks

Organic unity is the idea that a thing is made up of interdependent parts. For example, a body is made up of its constituent organs, and a society is made up of its constituent social roles. In Aristotle's Poetics he likened drama narrative's and action to organic form, presenting it as “a complete whole, with its several incidents so closely connected that the transposal or withdrawal of any one of them will disjoin and dislocate the whole.” The main theme of organic unity relies on a free-spirited style of writing and by following any guidelines or genre-based habits, the true nature of a work becomes stifled and unreliable on an artistic plane. The concept of organic unity gained popularity through the New Critics movement. Cleanth Brooks played an integral role in modernizing the organic unity principle. In The Well Wrought Urn, Brooks used the poem "The Canonization" by John Donne as an example to relate the importance of a work’s ability to flow and maintain a theme, so that the work gains momentum from beginning to end. Organic unity is the common thread that keeps a theme from becoming broken and disjointed as a work moves forward.

The Well Wrought Urn: Studies in the Structure of Poetry is a 1947 collection of essays by Cleanth Brooks. It is considered a seminal text in the New Critical school of literary criticism. The title contains an allusion to the fourth stanza of John Donne's poem, "The Canonization", which is the primary subject of the first chapter of the book.