The allegory is threefold,--moral, religious, and personal.
(a) _Moral Allegory._--The characters all represent various virtues and vices, whose intrigues and warfare against each other symbolize the struggle of the human soul after perfection. The Redcross Knight, for example, personifies the single private virtue of holiness, while Prince Arthur stands for that perfect manhood which combines all the moral qualities; Una represents abstract truth, while Gloriana symbolizes the union of all the virtues in perfect womanhood.
(b) _Religious or Spiritual Allegory._--Under this interpretation the Redcross Knight is a personification of Protestant England, or the church militant, while Una represents the true religion of the Reformed Church. On the other hand, Archimago symbolizes the deceptions of the Jesuits and Duessa the false Church of Rome masquerading as true religion.
(c) _Personal and Political Allegory._--Here we find a concrete presentation of many of Spenser's chief contemporaries. One of Spenser's prime objects in composing his epic was to please certain powerful persons at court, and above all to win praise and patronage from the vain and flattery loving queen, whom he celebrates as Gloriana. Prince Arthur is a character that similarly pays homage to Lord Leicester. In the Redcross Knight he compliments, no doubt, some gentleman like Sir Philip Sidney or Sir Walter Raleigh, as if he were a second St. George, the patron saint of England, while in Una we may see idealized some fair lady of the court. In Archimago he satirizes the odious King Philip II of Spain, and in false Duessa the fascinating intriguer, Mary Queen of Scots, who was undeserving so hard a blow.
KEY TO THE ALLEGORY IN BOOK I
_Characters_ _Moral_ _Religious and _Personal and Spirtual_ Political_
Redcross Knight Holiness Reformed England St George
Una Truth True Religion
Prince Arthur Magnificence, or Protestantism, or Lord Leicester Private Virtue the Church Militant
Gloriana Glory Spirtual Beauty Queen Elizabeth
Archimago Hypocrisy The Jesuits Phillip II of Spain
Duessa Falsehood False Religion Mary Queen of Scots, Church of Rome
Orgoglio Carnal Pride Antichrist Pope Sixtus V
The Lion Reason, Reformation by Force Henry VIII, Natural Honor Civil Government
The Dragon Sin The Devil, Satan Rome and Spain
Sir Satyrane Natural Courage Law and Order Sir John Perrott in Ireland
The Monster Avarice Greed of Romanism Romish Priesthood
Corceca Blind Devotion, Catholic Penance Irish Nuns Superstition
Abessa Flagrant Sin Immorality Irish Nuns
Kirkrapine Church Robbery Religious State Irish Clergy of Ireland and Laity
Sansfoy Infidelity
Sansjoy Joylessness Pagan Religion The Sultan and the Saracens
Sansloy Lawlessness
The Dwarf Prudence, Common Sense
Sir Trevisan Fear
The Squire Purity The Anglican Clergy
The Horn Truth The English Bible
Lucifera Pride, Vanity Woman of Babylon Church of Rome
4. THE SPENSERIAN STANZA.--The _Faerie Queene_ is written in the Spenserian Stanza, a form which the poet himself invented as a suitable vehicle for a long narrative poem. Suggestions for its construction were taken from three Italian metres--the Ottava Rima, the Terza Rima, the Sonnet--and the Ballade stanza. There are eight lines in the iambic pentameter measure (five accents); e.g.--
v -/- | v -/- | v -/- | v -/- | v -/- a gen | tle knight | was prick | ing on | the plaine followed by one iambic hexameter, or Alexandrine (six accents); e.g.--
v -/- | v -/- | v -/- | v -/- | v -/- | v -/- as one | for knight | ly giusts | and fierce | encount | ers fitt The rhymes are arranged in the following order: _ab ab bc bcc_. It will be observed that the two quatrains are bound together by the first two b rhymes, and the Alexandrine, which rhymes with the eighth line, draws out the harmony with a peculiar lingering effect. In scanning and reading it is necessary to observe the laws of accentuation and pronunciation prevailing in Spenser's day; e.g. in _learned_ (I, i), _undeserved_ (I, ii), and _woundes_ (V, xvii) the final syllable is sounded, _patience_ (X, xxix) is trisyllabic, _devotion_ (X, xl) is four syllables, and _entertainment_ (X, xxxvii) is accented on the second and fourth syllables. Frequently there is in the line a cæsural pause, which may occur anywhere; e.g.--
"And quite dismembred hath; | the thirsty land Dronke up his life; | his corse left on the strand." (III, xx.)
The rhythm of the meter is also varied by the alternating of end-stopped and run-on lines, as in the last quotation. An end-stopped line has a pause at the end, usually indicated by some mark of punctuation. A run-on line should be read closely with the following line with only a slight pause to indicate the line-unit. Monotony is prevented by the occasional use of a light or feminine ending--a syllable on which the voice does not or cannot rest; e.g.--
"Then choosing out few words most horrible." (I, xxxvii.) "That for his love refused deity." (III, xxi.) "His ship far come from watrie wilderness." (III, xxxii.)
The use of alliteration, i.e. having several words in a line beginning with the same letter, is another device frequently employed by Spenser for musical effect; e.g.--
"In which that wicked wight his dayes doth weare." (I, xxxvi.) "Sweet slombring deaw, the which to sleep them biddes." (I, xxxvi.)
5. VERSIFICATION.--In the handling of his stanza, Spenser revealed a harmony, sweetness, and color never before dreamed of in the English. Its compass, which admitted of an almost endless variety of cadence, harmonized well with the necessity for continuous narration. It appeals to the eye as well as to the ear, with its now languid, now vigorous, but always graceful turn of phrase. Its movement has been compared to the smooth, steady, irresistible sweep of water in a mighty river. Like Lyly, Marlowe, and Shakespeare, Spenser felt the new delight in the pictorial and musical qualities of words, and invented new melodies and word pictures. He aimed rather at finish, exactness, and fastidious neatness than at ease, freedom, and irregularity; and if his versification has any fault, it is that of monotony. The atmosphere is always perfectly adapted to the theme.
6. DICTION AND STYLE.--The peculiar diction of the _Faerie Queene_ should receive the careful attention of the student. As a romantic poet, Spenser often preferred archaic and semi-obsolete language to more modern forms. He uses four classes of words that were recognized as the proper and conventional language of pastoral and romantic poetry; viz. (a) _archaisms_, (b) _dialect_, (c) _classicisms_, and (d) _gallicisms_. He did not hesitate to adopt from Chaucer many obsolete words and grammatical forms. Examples are: the double negative with _ne_; _eyen_, _lenger_, _doen_, _ycladd_, _harrowd_, _purchas_, _raught_, _seely_, _stowre_, _swinge_, _owch_, and _withouten_. He also employs many old words from Layamon, Wiclif, and Langland, like _swelt_, _younglings_, _noye_, _kest_, _hurtle_, and _loft_. His dialectic forms are taken from the vernacular of the North Lancashire folk with which he was familiar. Some are still a part of the spoken language of that region, such as, _brent_, _cruddled_, _forswat_, _fearen_, _forray_, _pight_, _sithen_, _carle_, and _carke_.
Examples of his use of classical constructions are: the ablative absolute, as, _which doen_ (IV, xliii); the relative construction with _when_, as, _which when_ (I, xvii), _that when_ (VII, xi); the comparative of the adjective in the sense of "too," as, _weaker_ (I, xlv), harder (II, xxxvi); the participial construction after _till_, as, _till further tryall made_ (I, xii); the superlative of location, as, _middest_ (IV, xv); and the old gerundive, as, _wandering wood_ (I, xiii). Most of the gallicisms found are anglicized loan words from the French _romans d'aventure_, such as, _disseized_, _cheare_, _chappell_, _assoiled_, _guerdon_, _palfrey_, _recreaunt_, _trenchand_, _syre_, and _trusse_. Notwithstanding Spenser's use of foreign words and constructions, his language is as thoroughly English in its idiom as that of any of our great poets.
"I think that if he had not been a great poet," says Leigh Hunt, "he would have been a great painter."