Edmund Spenser, sonnets

IS ACTUALLY THE BELOVED ONE A STATIC VIEWER OR IS SHE ACTIVE?

In the very last line she’s depicted as a senseless stone. She’s defined as a idly seating, but she

laugh where lover’s suffer and she monks when he joys. So she reacts to what the lover does, but

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in a different way. It’s the most novelty introduced my Spenser the beloved one is no more

that eternal creature untouchable, she’s not a idealized woman, but she has her own personality.

WHAT IS THE THEME/IDEA THAT LIVE UNDER THOSE LINES? 

It’s the metaphor of life as a thater. It’s not the first time we get to know this concept if our

lives are stages, we are actors.

This is not new at all: Plato in many works of his (like Republic) talks about lives as stages and

humans as actors. It has to do with the Metaphor of the Gate, because the both underline the fact

that we are not living on Earth as much as we possibly can.

The difference is that we all know that in England in this year the importance of Protestant is

growing up: Elisabeth were pubblicly tollerant, but privatly she was annoyed by fanatism.

Spenser were close to Protestantism too, like Sidney.

PROTESTANTISM

Main features:

Embrace both Luthor and Calvin’s ideas;

- 

- It rejects idols (great amount of religious paintings went destroyed we are not abe to

describe divine things, that why thse paintings and sculptures were considered profane.

Henry VIII, from his devorce from Catholic Church, closes a lot of monasteries, which

was used as a gift for his favourites );

- Protestant churces: no paintings, no affrescos, no sculptures, nothing. We only find

passeges from the Bible. As much as in churches we don’t find any decorative elements,

the relationship between the protestant and God don’t require any priest (more private

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relation it was a great novelty for the time we are studying).

Metaphisical poets deal with existencial questions, mamy of them related to religious

questions. God is presented as if he was a brother or a father or a friend.

Idea of Predestination: there’s nothing you can

- do to change your destiny, because it is

already predetermined by God. The opposite is Free Will (are future is in our hands, so

we will collect what we have sow). The idea of Predestinations is regarded by all the

historian is a paradox: how can we compared the friendly relationship between human

and God and, on the other hand, the figure of God as a tirran, against who we could do

nothing.

God: in a traditional way the actors are humanity, the stage director is God (he is directly

involved). Who are the audience? Angels and Stars.

In a protestant way, God has already decided the plot, so he is not active. So what is his rule?

He is part of the audience, but he is not interested in what he is seeing.

How was the lady defined? He was defined as the Maker. So Elisabeth or the beloved is

identify in God. In the second line Spenser is deficting his beloved one as God.

This idea of life as a theater will be very important for Shakespeare, who will evolve this

concept.

LAST COUPLET:

to move: according to Sidney is the goal af all good poets.

Lady as a senseless stone: it’s not a novelty, it’s the topos of the cruelty of the lady (italian

topos). Why a senseless stone? In neoplatonic terms stone is the humble elements (according

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to the Greate Chain of Being) the sonnet opens paralleling woman and God and the sonnet

is concluded with the last chain. It’s a decention.

SONNET 74

Most happy letters fram’d by skilfull trade,

With which that happy name was first desynd:

That which three times thrise happy hath me made,

With guifts of body, fortune and of mind.

The first my being to me gave by kind,

From mothers womb deriv’d by dew descent,

The second is my sovereigne Queene most kind,

That honour and large richesse to me lent.

The third my love, my lives last ornament,

By whom my spirit out of dust was raysed:

To speake her prayse and gory excellent,

Of all alive most worthy to be praysed.

Ye three Elisabeths for ever live,

That three such graces did unto me give.

The sonnet is centred around the name Elisabeth.

Le più felici lettere disegnate/create da un’attività sapiente con cui quel felice nome fu

concepito per la prima volta (in sonnet 33 there’s another explicit references to the Queen),

che per tre volte mi ha reso felici. times because there’s three Elisabeth: his mother, his

THRISE: three times. He says it three

Queen and his wife. It’s a gradatio. By saying three times three, he were reffering to the

product of three, that is nine, the number of letters the name Elisabeth is made of. So this

happy letters are nine.

La prima Elisabeth è colei che ha dato alla luce il mio essere giustamente disceso dal suo

grembo (from the world of Ideas). La seconda è la mia sovrana, molto amata/gentile, che mi

ha dato onore e grandi ricchezze. La terza è il mio amore, l’ornamento decisivo della mia

vita, grazie a cui il mio spirito è stato inalzato dalla cenere/polvere.

This references of being rised from dust into gold is a chemical image. So the beloved one is

compered not only to God, but also to the philosopher’s stone.

Per esprimere la sua lode e la sua gloria eccellente che meritano le celebrazione sopra tutti i

viventi, voi tre Elisabette siate sempre vive, voi tre Elisabette che siete quelle tre grazie che

mi sono state donate.

Who are the three graces? Aglaria, Eufrosine and Talia. The three graces are daughters of

Zeus. They stand for grace, charm and beauty (fascino, grazia e bellezza). They live with the

Muses, so we can say that Spenser is indirectly invoking the Muses.

SONNET 75

One day I wrote her name upon the strand,

but came the waves and washed it a way:

agayne I wrote it with a second hand,

but came the tyde, and made my paynes his pray.

Vayne man, sayd she, that doest in vaine assay,

a mortall thing so to immortalize.

for I my selve shall lyke to this decay,

and eek my name bee wyped out lykewize.

Not so, (quod I) let baser things devize

to dy in dust, but you shall live by fame:

my verse your vertues rare shall eternize,

and in the hevens wryte your glorious name,

Where whenas death shall all the world subdew,

our love shall live, and later life renew.

Un giorno scrissi il suo nome sulla spiaggia/sabbia, ma arrivarono le onde e lo lavarono

via/lo cancellarono: di nuovo lo scrissi, ma arrivo la marea e trasformò I miei dolori nella sua

preda.

Uomo vano, disse lei

Second quatrain is the speech of hers. We don’t know only the beloved reaction, but we

listen also to her critical words, this is the beloved’s scolled.

TO SCOLL: rimproverare.

In the first time in the story of sonnets, the beloved one is active, in fact she critized her

lover, so she has a strong personality, non idealized.

Two different ways to write a words: Vayne and Vaine. Why does she repeated the same

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word twice? In the Ecclesiae, what is “vanitas” is beauty and our life in general painting

genre of “Memento Mori” remained us of what is vain in our lives.

What are the elements that make us aware of the shortness of our life? Flowers (like Lorenzo

de Medici remained us in his works: he wrote a lot of vanitas). Mirrors (they allude to vanity

because we look at ourselves-the image in the mirror exist only where is someone in front of

the mirror, at the same time the scenario went down when we are dead). Skulls.

Remerber what vanitas are involved with = it has to do also with “Everyman”. The moralities are

still important at this time.

Hourglasses: clessidre, before the invention of clocks, which were invented in early 20s.

Skulls: teschi.

Mirrors: in platonical terms they are the instruments through we can know divinity. When Dante

is reaching God, he’s able so look at Him not directly, because he is mortal, he look at Him

through Beatrice’s eyes.

Candle: one of the most used symbols of mortal dimention.

Repetition of the term “Vaine”.

Di nuovo lo scrissi, ma arrivò la marea e fece dei miei dolori la sua preda.

– –

This sonnet comes after the turning point (64 kiss - and 67 speaker that hunt and catch the

deer ) of the collection. 68-89 have to do with the betrothal between the two lovers. Maybe it is

the most romantic of the collection.

Not only she appear as Stella, but she critizes the lirical speakers.

Uomo vano, che vanamente cerca di immortalare una cosa mortale

What is she saying? He has just written her name on the sand in order to immortalized it. But it

was deleted because it can be immortalized. Why? Because she is a mortal being and so her

name too.

Perchè io stessa faccio parte di questa decadenza. E anche il mio nome sarà cancellato allo stesso

modo. Non è così, risposi io. Che le cose meschine/terrene/più basse facciano in modo di morire

nella polvere.

TO DEVICE: costruire

Ma voi (rapporto ancora formale) vivrete attraverso o grazie la fama.

FAME: his verses. According to Sidney, a good poety allowed the beloved one to be preserved

in memory. This concept will be used by Shakespears in the so called Immortality Sonnets.

Il mio verso renderà eterne le tue virtù rare

Lady is no common lady. Rare virtues has a very important function in the sonnet.

Il mio verso nel cielo scrive il vostro nome glorioso, dove quando la morte tramuterà tutto il

la vita dell’aldilà, quindi the world of

polvere, il mondo intero il nostro amore vivrà e rinnoverà

Ideas.

We can feel there’s approch between the two, thanks to the pronuons “she” and “you”.

Her name becomes your name, so they are approching. In fact in the last line, Spenser uses the

pronoun “our”. 

Language is very simple: there is a willing choice by Spenser the semplicity of the language

increase the atmosphere of intimacy between the lover and the beloved one. The speech is direct

and simple. Many critics belive the verse suggest a musical movement.

The repetition of “name” suggests it’s the methafor of lady: he decided to rhyme it with fame.

What is the witt in this sonnet? The answer of the lover, of the poet demonstrate that his poem

and of the time. It’s not just the

has the power to annihilate the critic both of the beloved one

lirical voice, but his verse is able to guarantee immortality due to the virtues of the beloved one.

The rare virtues are an active subject because thanks to them he is able to become immortal in

order of his work. (SIMPOSIUM by PLATO).

Arthur Golding in the fifties translates the metamorphosis of Ovidio, so the Elisabethian court

 The origins of poetry clearly referes to the rule of the poet “vate”. In

known it at the time

ancient time they were considered messagers of he