THE FAIRIE QUEENE:
THE BODY AND THE BOOK

Jan. 28

Lecture Topic
Introduction

Readings
Letter to Raleigh, Dedicatory sonnets, and Cantos 1-2

Discussion Topics and Questions
  1. Consider the rhetorical effect of the dedicatory sonnets.
  2. Compare the rhetorical effects of the letter and the sonnets.
  3. Is there a contradiction in addressing the poem to Elizabeth and then writing a prefatory letter to a courtier?

Feb. 2

Lecture Topic
The Language of the Book: Typology and Allegory

Readings
Cantos 3-6

Discussion Topics and Questions
  1. What is typology? Find three examples from the Bible and three examples from The Fairie Queene.
  2. How does the letter to Raleigh help you to read the text?

Feb. 4

Lecture Topic
Monsters inside and outside The Fairie Queene

Readings
Cantos 7-8

Discussion Topics and Questions
  1. Locate five monsters in the text and consider what discourses might be associated with them.
  2. Please be prepared for a discussion of the monster in literature and culture.

Feb. 9

Lecture Topic
Hieronymus Bosch

Readings
See Hieronymus Bosch and WebMuseum: Bosch, Hieronymus.

Discussion Topics and Questions
  1. How does Bosch represent the monster in his paintings?
  2. Attempt a psychoanalytic reading of The Last Judgement.
  3. How does Bosch's The Last Judgement as well as his other paintings help us to read The Fairie Queene?

Feb. 11

Lecture Topic
The Book behind the Book: Revelation and The Fairie Queene

Readings
Cantos 9-12, especially Canto 11, and Revelation.

Discussion Topics and Questions
  1. Consider the biblical symbolism in Cantos 10-11.
  2. How does Spenser use Revelation for the purposes of his poem?

Feb. 23

Lecture Topic
The Imagination in the Body and the Book

Readings
Handout on Early Modern Imagination

Discussion Topics and Questions
  1. How did early modernity imagine the imagination?

Feb. 25

Lecture Topic
Archimago

Readings
Cantos in which Archimago appears

Discussion Topics and Questions
  1. How does Archimago represent imagination in the poem?
  2. If images and imagination are not to be trusted, how can we accept Spenser? Is Spenser an Archimago figure?