Faerie Queene
Qintarah Noureen Khan
BS-3rd (section 2) “FAERIE QUEENE”
QUESTION:
The Faerie Queene is not only an innovative literary composition as an epic; it is also a work whose relevance does not fade with the passage of time because of its superb allegorical structure. Discuss in detail.
ANSWER:
In the old times it was considered that a poet is a great poet only if he writes an epic. The great poets of ancient times like Homer and Virgil achieved the zenith of fame in poetry because of their epics. In contrast to those ancient languages, English was comparatively a new and developing language, so it did not boast of any epic. Edmund Spenser is known as the first English epic poet and by writing his epic the Faerie Queene he rendered a valuable service to the language. He was well versed in foreign epics and it inspired him to develop a new epic in his own language. Before writing his own epic he keenly studied the Greek and Italian epics and then based his own epic on those models, but he did not blindly imitate those epics, rather he developed a style of his own. Spenser’s is an innovative style, he experimented with rhyme and rhythm and instead of using the used and worn out styles he invented his own style. Spenser developed his own nine lined stanza known as the Spenserian stanza. In a Spenserian stanza the first eight lines are in the iambic pentameter and the ninth one is in the iambic hexameter or Alexandrine. Spenser’s meter is so ample and smooth that it introduces a slumber and the reader feels himself getting absorbed in the images of the Faery land. The poet used this stanza in all books but throughout there is not even a single quiver or obstacle that disturbs the powerful monotony. And thus the epic induces a hypnotic effect on the reader.
J.R Lowell remarks:
“The service that Spenser did to literature by his exquisite sense of harmony is incalculable” Spenser made another innovation in the epic tradition by using
BS-3rd (section 2) “FAERIE QUEENE”
QUESTION:
The Faerie Queene is not only an innovative literary composition as an epic; it is also a work whose relevance does not fade with the passage of time because of its superb allegorical structure. Discuss in detail.
ANSWER:
In the old times it was considered that a poet is a great poet only if he writes an epic. The great poets of ancient times like Homer and Virgil achieved the zenith of fame in poetry because of their epics. In contrast to those ancient languages, English was comparatively a new and developing language, so it did not boast of any epic. Edmund Spenser is known as the first English epic poet and by writing his epic the Faerie Queene he rendered a valuable service to the language. He was well versed in foreign epics and it inspired him to develop a new epic in his own language. Before writing his own epic he keenly studied the Greek and Italian epics and then based his own epic on those models, but he did not blindly imitate those epics, rather he developed a style of his own. Spenser’s is an innovative style, he experimented with rhyme and rhythm and instead of using the used and worn out styles he invented his own style. Spenser developed his own nine lined stanza known as the Spenserian stanza. In a Spenserian stanza the first eight lines are in the iambic pentameter and the ninth one is in the iambic hexameter or Alexandrine. Spenser’s meter is so ample and smooth that it introduces a slumber and the reader feels himself getting absorbed in the images of the Faery land. The poet used this stanza in all books but throughout there is not even a single quiver or obstacle that disturbs the powerful monotony. And thus the epic induces a hypnotic effect on the reader.
J.R Lowell remarks:
“The service that Spenser did to literature by his exquisite sense of harmony is incalculable” Spenser made another innovation in the epic tradition by using