Renaissance Poetry

Introduction Edmund Spenser

Life Story Major Works Commments

Philip Sidney
Life story Works and Comments

Renaissance Poetry
English Renaissance witness the flourishing of poetry. England produced so many poets that it was labeled a nest of singing birds. Thomas Wyatt introduced SONNET and Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey introduced blank verse into English poetry.

Edmund Spenser
Edmund Spenser and Philip Sidney are the two most important poets of the English Renaissance. They were labeled court poets because they were of noble birth. Spenser was known as the Poets Poet by later generation.

Spenser had a very good education at Merchant Taylors School and then at Cambridge. In 1580, he was appointed secretary to Lord Grey of Wilton, the queens deputy in Ireland. In 1598, a fierce Irish rebellion broke out. Spenser was forced to escape from Ireland. In 1599, he died for want of bread (Ben Jonsons words) and was buried in Westminster Abbey.

Edmund Spensers Works

The Shepherds Calender (1579)
His 12 eclogues represent the 12 months of the year and discuss themes of love, religion, poetry and others.

The Faerie Queene (1580)

His masterpiece dedicated to Queen Elizabeth

Amoretti (1594)
His best known sonnet sequence of love

The Faerie Queene

Spenser plans 12 books, each one with a hero standing for the private virtues. The two main characters that serves as the unity of the book are Arthur & Gloriana. Redcrosse Knight represents St. George/Holiness Sir Guyon stands for Temperance

Qualities of Spensers poetry

a perfect melody; a rare sense of beauty; a splendid imagination; a lofty moral purity and seriousness; a dedicated idealism

Spenserian Stanza
Spenserian stanza is invented by Edmund Spenser, one of the most representative poets of English Renaissance. It is a stanza of 9 lines, with the first 8 lines in iambic pentameter and the 9th line in iambic hexameter (alexandrine), rhyming ababbcbcc.

Philip Sidney 1554-1586

born of an aristocratic family Graduated from Oxford and tour around the Continent A favorite of the Queen, he was appointed governor of Flushing in the Netherlands. He died in the battle. While dying, he handed his water to a nearby soldier and said,Thy need is greater than mine.

Major works
Arcadia
A prose romance filled with lyrics

Astrophel and Stella

The sonnet sequence that makes sonnet popular in England

An Apology for Poetry

The earliest critical work in English literary history that advocates to teach & to delight.