Chaprer 8 Spenser ANDREW HADFIELD dmund Spenser (55-53) may well have been the mos ifuesial and innovative poes Wao ever tein Engh Jus afer Spenser poblsed The ‘Shoptnndes Clee in 157, Se Philip iey, eng poorly on te dearth of egish pony in the 98, thought tha only the work of Chau, he ys of the Bal of Srey, A Minor for Magtates a Spenser's poem Were wor’ reading” Scney was exaggerating for polemical elec, of coun. Bat a0 astonishing publishing earerof seventeen years Spenser wansformed the rane, nacre and poten of English eters He produced thes new wesions ofthe pastoral (The Caled, Cn Cuts come ome spine, Vie Gna, poised Tener wih a fend, Gabel Harvey (Thee Pop, and we, flr ee) a beat lable (Mother Hubbers Tal 2 sequence of secular and sacred hymns (The Rome Hypa), & sonnet sequence and ether cllecons of sonnets (The “Amore, Vins ofthe Word Vane, The Rs of Rome, The Vin of Pear) 4 dreara vision (Te Fans of Tine) legis (Daphne, Atop an pylon o€ Tile epic (poo alamene (Tete of the Mae mage hyn (The pthalaon: an pice poem Prahalanon collection of Compas, and 2 new form of epic romance, The Faee Quen. Ben Jonson famously com rented to Wiliam Drummond tha Spenser ‘in affecting the Ancient, wrt Tangoape’a commen: which gives us ania of what adnan noma he seemed his contemporaries, and that we should see him as a forceily Cspesimentl poet eager io transform the landscape of Engloh poetry? Tis trove than ae en then, ha Spenser has mos frequently been regarded asa conservative figure, slavish adherent othe Quee’s court oF as Kal Mark rather more clourfaly pucit,"Blebet’ are sing post? Spenser obviously shared Sdney’s analysis of the present sate of ngs poetry and his career can be sedn as a snglehanded attempt eo revitalise tnd rethink hat could be done in Eghish, In his early leeors wo Harvey (eo), published just ater the Caloer~ probably by Harvey raher than Spenser ~ Spenser exclaims, "Why a God's name may aot we, as ese the 6 Spenser Greeks, have the kingdom of our own language?’ "The plea is that English right be able to plot its own destiny, just as Greek was able to seize the caltural agenda when establishing European culture. Spenser's hope is that English culture may now be able to sval that of ancient Greece, placing fngland in the vanguard of Buropean Jeers as a rival co its preeminent contemporaris,Ialy and France. re i confident that his poetry will rans form the primitive state of English Literature and produce work that is as epoch making as that of Homer, Virgil, Dante and Petrarch, and wihich will eclipse that of Ronsard, Du Bellay, Tass, Boiardo and Ariosto. In one of his published Jerers to Harvey, Spenser signals his intention to wite English in cuantitative rather than aceentual mee, based on the length of syllables rnther than stress patterns, in imitation of Lari vetse, a farther means of snaking English ‘affect the anciens' and so establish its credentials as a serious literary language. Spenser refers with approval co the experiments of Sidney and Pévward Dyer: ‘they haue by authoriie of heir whole Senate, prescribed certain Lawes and rules of Quantities of English slabs, for English verse: hauing had thereof already greate practise, and drawen see to their faction’? For good measare, Spenser and Hlazvey attach afew of their works to the lecers, buc the experiment with quantitative mere was not a success and did not catch on, Spenser rumming instead to the home-grown style in che array of metrical forms on display inthe Calender From the star ofhisliterary career, Spenser looked back both tothe ancients and naive vernacular poes, principally Chaucer, but also to Langland and Gower, and across to Burope, combining forms, styles and regiers as 4 means of establishing command over English, Ia the Calender Spenser imitates Viegl by beginning his literary career with a pastoral poem, signaling his cvenmal move towards the epic” He also employs the forms and syle of European writers, sch as the neo-Latin eclogues of Mantuan and the pas- torals and eleges ofthe French poet, Clément Maro, as the commentator, E.K (perhaps another pseudonym of Spensex himsel, acknowledges * The series of poems employs a number of native models, teary and popula, principally the almanac/ealendar that it imitates, The Calender also eonains characters such as Diggon Davie and Piers, who come from a well-established [English tation of ploughman poetry written inthe wake of Pers owas? ‘And, of course, Spenser's adoption ofthe name Colin Cou isborcowed from Jn Skelton's verse, establishing a ink roa Henscian taditon. ‘The Calender is a showease work. The book is produced a though it ‘were a humanist edition ofa majos Latin water, with commentary, woodcut, dedications, and ina carefully chosen vaviety of fonts” It also has a w