Spenser's Sonnet 37
January 12th 2009 03:29
This is a very late edition of Sonnet Sunday: my apologies. I just got settled back in at school, and the obligatory and inevitable welcoming of friends delayed this post considerably. It's still Sunday on the U.S. east coast, so that has to count for something, right?...Right?
Sonnet 37 from Sir Edmund Spenser's "Amoretti":
What guyle is this, that those her golden tresses,
She doth attire under a net of gold:
And with sly skill so cunningly them dresses,
That which is gold or heare can scarse be told?
Is it that mens frayle eyes, which gaze too bold,
She may entangle in that golden snare:
And being caught may craftily enfold
Theyr weaker harts, which are not wel aware?
Take heed, therefore, myne eyes, how ye doe stare
Henceforth too rashly on that guilefull net,
In which if ever ye entrapped are,
Out of her bands ye by no means shall get.
Fondnesse it were for any being free,
To covet fetters, though they golden bee.
Written by Edmund Spenser, an English poet of Renaissance England, sometime between 1552 and 1599 (his lifetime). Despite the older spellings, most of the words sound like and mean the same things they do today, except for 'fondnesse' which meant 'foolishness' and 'heare' meant 'hair'.
I like Spenser a lot because he was an extremely prolific writer and possibly the most gifted poet ever (definitely my opinion here), because he not only wrote simply great poetry, but he was a great innovator in the field. This sonnet, for example, takes the form that he himself invented, which we now call the Spenserian Sonnet. It has an interlocking rhyme scheme of ABABBCBCCDCDEE. I appreciate this, because I think it makes the poem flow very nicely, and it can help the flow of ideas from quatrain to quatrain.
Aside from having gorgeous linguistic elements and complex yet everyday ideas, I think this poem is a perfect example of the sonnet in its purest form. The first quatrain introduces the conceit, or extended metaphor, that powers the poem, and the next 2 quatrains advance that idea to make it more complex or add to it, and the couplet acts as a nice capstone for the poem as well as opening it up to interpretation. Since he doesn't state who is being fettered, it could be the man in the story, or the woman, too, as I see it. Spenser did a nice job of suggesting, not stating. This is what a sonnet should be like.
Although Spenser wrote hundreds of years ago, the archaic spelling he used was not actually the common usage of the time. He purposefully used older spelling to try and emulate Chaucer, who was hailed as the greatest English writer. Spenser's contemporaries (Shakespeare, Sidney, etc.) used many of the same spellings that we have today. While some people hate it, I think it gives character to him and his poetry.
He was, and still is, one of the most prolific and innovative English poets. Aside from fiddling (quite successfully) with verse forms, he was the first writer to aspire to (and achieved his goal of) being a poet full-time, to have it be his identity. Everyone before him had day jobs and wrote on the side...he successfully made it his life. Not many people even today can claim to have accomplished this.
He wrote the fairy-tale epic The Fairie Queene as poetry...tough to read, but very much worth it. I recommend looking up any of his other poetry and works. He led a fascinating life in a fascinating world, and his poetry can attest to that.
Tomorrow I'll examine one of Robert Frost's most famous poems, and also one of his shortest, to see how he achieved such poetic power in such few lines. A lot of scholars believe it helped him win the Pulitzer prize. See you tomorrow!
Sonnet 37 from Sir Edmund Spenser's "Amoretti":
What guyle is this, that those her golden tresses,
She doth attire under a net of gold:
And with sly skill so cunningly them dresses,
That which is gold or heare can scarse be told?
Is it that mens frayle eyes, which gaze too bold,
She may entangle in that golden snare:
Theyr weaker harts, which are not wel aware?
Take heed, therefore, myne eyes, how ye doe stare
Henceforth too rashly on that guilefull net,
In which if ever ye entrapped are,
Out of her bands ye by no means shall get.
Fondnesse it were for any being free,
To covet fetters, though they golden bee.
Written by Edmund Spenser, an English poet of Renaissance England, sometime between 1552 and 1599 (his lifetime). Despite the older spellings, most of the words sound like and mean the same things they do today, except for 'fondnesse' which meant 'foolishness' and 'heare' meant 'hair'.
I like Spenser a lot because he was an extremely prolific writer and possibly the most gifted poet ever (definitely my opinion here), because he not only wrote simply great poetry, but he was a great innovator in the field. This sonnet, for example, takes the form that he himself invented, which we now call the Spenserian Sonnet. It has an interlocking rhyme scheme of ABABBCBCCDCDEE. I appreciate this, because I think it makes the poem flow very nicely, and it can help the flow of ideas from quatrain to quatrain.
Aside from having gorgeous linguistic elements and complex yet everyday ideas, I think this poem is a perfect example of the sonnet in its purest form. The first quatrain introduces the conceit, or extended metaphor, that powers the poem, and the next 2 quatrains advance that idea to make it more complex or add to it, and the couplet acts as a nice capstone for the poem as well as opening it up to interpretation. Since he doesn't state who is being fettered, it could be the man in the story, or the woman, too, as I see it. Spenser did a nice job of suggesting, not stating. This is what a sonnet should be like.
Although Spenser wrote hundreds of years ago, the archaic spelling he used was not actually the common usage of the time. He purposefully used older spelling to try and emulate Chaucer, who was hailed as the greatest English writer. Spenser's contemporaries (Shakespeare, Sidney, etc.) used many of the same spellings that we have today. While some people hate it, I think it gives character to him and his poetry.
He was, and still is, one of the most prolific and innovative English poets. Aside from fiddling (quite successfully) with verse forms, he was the first writer to aspire to (and achieved his goal of) being a poet full-time, to have it be his identity. Everyone before him had day jobs and wrote on the side...he successfully made it his life. Not many people even today can claim to have accomplished this.
He wrote the fairy-tale epic The Fairie Queene as poetry...tough to read, but very much worth it. I recommend looking up any of his other poetry and works. He led a fascinating life in a fascinating world, and his poetry can attest to that.
Tomorrow I'll examine one of Robert Frost's most famous poems, and also one of his shortest, to see how he achieved such poetic power in such few lines. A lot of scholars believe it helped him win the Pulitzer prize. See you tomorrow!
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