The Faerie Queene (Book 4): Spenser

The Faerie Queene (1590) was one of the most influential poems in the English language. Dedicating his work to Elizabeth I, Spenser brilliantly united Arthurian romance and Italian renaissance epic to celebrate the glory of the Virgin Queen. Each book of the poem recounts the quest of a knight to achieve a virtue: the Red Crosse Knight of Holiness, who must slay a dragon and free himself from the witch Duessa; Sir Guyon, Knight of Temperance, who escapes the Cave of Mammon and destroys Acrasia’s Bower of Bliss; and the lady-knight Britomart’s search for her Sir Artegall, revealed to her in an enchanted mirror. Although composed as a moral and political allegory, The Faerie Queene’s magical atmosphere captivated the imaginations of later poets from Milton to the Victorians.

References to The Faerie Queene abide throughout Melville's works (for instance, in the "Extracts" of Moby-Dick and the epigraphs of "The Encantadas"). In addition, Carole Moses notes a number of structural similarities between it and Melville's Mardi: "the climactic meeting between Taji and Hautia echoes" the Bower of Bliss; Yillah "relies heavily on Spenser's Garden of Adonis and Temple of Love" with "details...from Scudamour"; "Spenserian allusion" links Yillah with Una; Media, Yoomy, Babbalanja, and Mohi are delineated ala "Spenser's House of Temperance"; and "Alma seems based on the Spenserian character of the same name."

Book IV is titled "The Legend of Cambell and Telamond, or Of Friendship." A three-day tournament is held where Britomart beats Artegall and recognizes him as the man in the enchanted mirror. Artegall pledges his love to her but must first leave and complete his quest.

Faerie Queene (Book 4): ~105pp

• PDF
• Luminarium
• Google books
• Librivox 5h 19m

Supplemental:

• Critial Readings podcast
• Stories from the Faerie Queen

Faerie Queen (modernized, annotated, and abridged):

• Amazon

Extracts:

• "They [allegorically, "the Irish"] are arrant cannibals...and desire the privilege of eating each other up." (Mardi, 2.48)
• "“You see,” said poet Blandmour, enthusiastically...“you see, my friend, that the blessed almoner, Nature, is in all things beneficent...“" ("Poor Man's Pudding")

This meetup is part in a series on Muses and Monsters.