“An over-faint quietness”, wrote Sir Philip Sidney in 1581, “should seem to strew the house for poets.” Hitherto the scholar and courtier, had ruled domain of fantasy with pleasing and graceful though not very vital results. But the words were no sooner uttered than force came into poetry that speedily dispersed the “over-faint quietness”. Spenser came at a crucial moment in English poetry.
The spell of Italy had taken hold of our senses, without gripping the heart and conscience. Ascham’s suspicion of the novel, and his hostile attitude towards Italian influence, did at any rate represent one side of national feeling. The revival of letters had merged into the Protestant Revolution; but the influence of Germany and Italy were hitherto antagonistic forces in English literature.
It is impossible not to feel that the verse of Surrey, and of Gascoigne, reflect only in part national character and temperament. Now in Spenser, the Puritan side and the artistic side are merged and reconciled. Spenser is at once child of the Renaissance and the Reformation. On one side we may regard him with Milton as “the sage and serious Spenser,” on the other he is the Humanist, alive to the finger-tips with the sensuous beauty of Southern Romance.
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In “Merry London, my most kindly nurse,” in his own words, Edmund Spenser was born about 1552. His father (of a Lancashire family related to the noble house of Spenser) was a journeyman cloth- maker, and was living in London before 1550. Of his mother, Elizabeth, nothing is known. His education began as a “spending of the money of Robert Newel,” and at Merchant Taylor’s School opened in 1561. In 1569 he matriculated at Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, and in 1576 took his degree of M.A. There is little doubt, judging from work he did at this time, that he showed remarkable ability. His Miscellany published by Dr. Jan van deer Nod, called “A Theatre for Worldlings,”showed considerable promise, but was only later acknowledged by Spenser.
(1) The Shepherd’s Calendar, entered at Stationers’ Hall December 5,1579.
(2) Colin Clout’s Come Home Again, published 1595.
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(3) Faerie Queen, first three books published, 1590.
(4) Faerie Queen, second three books published, 1596
(5) Two Cantos of some following books of the Faerie Queen, 1609.
(6) Complaints, nine miscellaneous poems appeared early in 1591. One of these, Minopotmos, or Fate of the Butterfly, had already been issued in 1590.
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(7) Prospopoia or more often called Mother Hubbard’s Tale, a satire. This is amongst the collection.
(8) Daphnia, an elegy, 1592.
(9) Amoretti, and Epithalamion, 1595.
(10) Prothalamion, a “Spousal” Ode, privately printed in 1596.
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(11) Four Hymns, now lost, in 1596.
(12) Strophe, an Arcadian elegy on Sir Philip Sidney’s death, 1596. This same year he wrote his prose treatise, View of Ireland.
The formal modifications characterizing the Shakespearean form of sonnets were first of all introduced by Daniel and Drayton.
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(I) Drayton’s sonnet, A Parting, is a magnificent piece of verse, sure in its handling, at once strong and restrained in its expression of passion.
(II) Daniel’s work, though less masterly, is skilful and pleasing always, occasionally touching great heights; but Daniel, no less than Drayton, did for Shakespeare’s sonneteering, much what Marlowe did for his blank verse. They showed the way, his genius did the rest.
(III) Around Spenser are number of verse writers, who, while influenced large by him and to a less extent by Sidney in their choice of subject, have yet sufficient creative power of their own to make us realize the richness of the poetic wealth now to our hand.
(a) There is GILES FLETCHER, graceful and fantastic; the many sided THOMAS LODGE, whose madrigals are unexcelled for dainty sweetness;
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(b) WILLIAM PERCY, to whose scholarly gifts might be added the more dubious accomplishment of copious ale-drinking, and whose work is suggestive of contemporary French as well as the usual Italian influences;
(c) The mysterious “J.C.” with his pretty aphoristic gift displayed in six-line stanzas.
(IV) There are also NICHOLAS BRETON, versatile in moods and methods, but at hir. happiest in sentimental conceits; and HENRY CONSTABLE, whose sonnets have no small measure of Spenser’s sensuous charm.
(V) Michael Drayton is one of the most astonishing writers of his time. His versatility was amazing and there is scarcely any side of poetic craftsmanship which he could not tackle with success. His literary life opens in 1591, with the Harmony of the Church; his sacred verse not pleasing, he reappears in 1593 with the Shepherd’s Garland, an experiment in pastoral verse. Then came the Barons ‘War, and England’s Heroically Epistles, while in later life the colossal Polyolbion, inspired by patriotic sentiment. As an historical poet he may be regarded as the Scott of his age, and his Ballad of Agincourt is a splendid specimen of its kind. Quite in another key is the quaint and fantastic Nymphidia; while his satirical gift is well illustrated in short poems like The Owl and The man in the Moon.
Though there is satirical fancy, of course, to be found in English poetry from Saxon times onwards but the first definite satirist is Skelton. Gascoigne’s Steel Glass is less clumsy; and he is followed by Joseph Hall with his Virgidemiarum; Lodge’s satires are not equal to his romantic work, but Hall, though far inferior in general literary power, is a better artist in the domain of satire; and is interesting as a social historian. Donne is so much more than a satirist and his writings have so many striking points of interest that he is best considered in dealing with the late Renaissance period.
Spenser’s Lyric School:
Spenser’s lyric school is famous for the sudden flowering of the lyric during second half of the sixteenth century specially in terms of the persistent study of foreign poetry and the growing popularity of music. Some components of this school have been discussed below-
(1) Such brilliant musicians as BYRD, TALLIS, and DOWLAND needed articulate expression for their sweet lute melodies. The gift of song no doubt was dormant in many an Elizabethan verse-writer. It needed some outside stimulus to call it forth; and assuredly at no time in our history has there been so rich a company of singers; some already famous in other directions as dramatists or novelists, many quite unknown save for their “short swallow flights of song”.
(2) WILLIAM BYRD is the earliest of these singers, but his verse is characterized by its quaint moralizing rather than by any flight of fancy. Lighter in texture are the songs of John Dorland, famed for his “heavenly touch upon the lute.” In the last years of the sixteenth century he published two volumes of “Songs and Airs.” Take this charming snatch from the first volume (1597);
“Dear, if change, I’ll never choose again;
Sweet, if you shrink, I’ll never think of love;
Fair, if you fail, I’ll judge all beauty vain;
Wise, if too weak, more wits I’ll never prove.
Dear, sweet, fair, wise! Change, shrink, nor
be not weak;
And, on my faith, my faith shall never break.”
(3) CAMPION distinguished himself in three capacities putting aside him fame as a musician. He wrote masques, among the best of their kind; displayed this nimble wit and scholarship in Latin verse, and discussed in prose form the values of music and poetry.
Campion’s songs are light as thistledown, and float away in the air. Of his sonneteering we have already spoken.
(4) Following these came JOHN, DANIEL, ROBERT JONES, THOMAS MORLEY, and in the early years of the seventeenth century a crowd of names, about whom in many cases little is known save for the gay and tender lyrics ascribed to them.