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Spence Farmer

Dr. Conaway

British Literature

21 February 2020

The Multidimensionality of Elizabethan Poetry

During the late 16th century and early 17th century, sophisticated literary culture in

England existed and thrived among the courts of nobility. In 1558, Queen Elizabeth, “endowed

with intelligence, courage, eloquence, and a talent for self-display,” took the throne and ushered

in a bright yet tension-filled era for England (Greenblatt, “Elizabeth I” 403). It’s within this

context that a new, English breed of courtly poetry was born, building on a centuries old tradition

stemming from both France and Italy. English poetry of this era, however, was unique in its

literary complexity; the court of English nobility was a tight knit sphere of familial and political

culture. Prolific authors of the genre would incorporate many facets of meaning into their work,

adding personal, political, and moral allegory to a universally appealing format; however, the

layers of meaning weaved into their poetry are not often apparent. In analysis of the circulation

of Phillip Sidney’s Astrophil and Stella,, Arthur Marotti observes: “We should not be surprised

at the relative absence of autobiographical and historical details in the sequence, for, in the

socioliterary situation in which Sidney wrote and circulated his work, the readers would have

been able to supply a great deal of contextual information and interpretation” (Marotti 399-400).

The nonexplicit nature of the work’s complexity necessitates modern readers to approach the

work with a keen, historical eye to discover the extent to which any given poetry of the time was

multi-dimensional. The questions, then, for an analytical reader of the genre are as follows: what
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are the major archetypes of English courtly love poetry, and how does each categorical trope

lend itself to a plurality of moral, political, and personal meaning?

To explore this question, it is productive to analyze examples of poetry from the most

relevant authors of the time. In the Norton Anthology of British Literature, Philip Sidney is noted

as writing “the most influential sonnet cycle of the Elizabethan Age.” (Greenblatt, “Sidney”

504). Not only the most influential, perhaps, but also the first of his kind. Sidney’s genius was

his innovation to leverage Petrarchan love poetry as a means of safe socioeconomic and

sociopolitical commentary (Marotti 399). Thus, his work set a literary precedent for elevated

poetic complexity for the writers that followed him.

In Astrophil and Stella, Sidney writes from the perspective of the Lover, Astrophil, who

wrestles with his feelings for the Beloved, Stella. In Sonnet 20, for example, Sidney employs the

traditional “martyred heart” trope, a subset of a broader trend in courtly love poetry to criticize

the Beloved’s cruelty and equates one’s descent into love with misfortune. Again, in Sonnet 2,

love is characterized as a random burden and a wound. This genre of sonnet often follows an

archetypal narrative: The Lover mourns the lack of affectionate reciprocation from the Beloved,

and he grapples with love’s powerful and seemingly inescapable consequences. Yet, much more

lurks beneath the surface of Sidney’s work. Sidney implicitly extends the breadth of the poem as

a definition of the nature of love. Astrophil’s attitudes are predicated on an axiom of the poetic

genre: love is painful and harsh – even deadly. There is an inherent moral assertion within the

poem that infatuation is negative and generally random – a detriment to one’s virtue. In Sonnet

20 Cupid is a murder, and Astrophil has been ambushed by his feelings; the poetry aims to teach

its audience of the dangers of love. Finally, yet another layer of interpretation can be derived

from the Sidney’s political circumstance. Sidney was removed from Queen Elizabeth’s court
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after confronting her about a potential suitor based on his religious standing (Greenblatt,

“Sidney” 504). The deeper commentary of thwarted loyalty and painful affection in Astrophil

and Stella can be interpreted as a commentary on his excommunication from the court and his

deep but conflictual love for his country. Marotti observes the larger trend of such association,

explaining: “In the Elizabethan courtly context ambition and envy were thus translated into

amorous ‘hope’ and ‘jealousy,’ the socially more acceptable terms” (Marotti 399). Sidney’s

frustrations could be communicated and understood by his peers in a socially appropriate way

through his dual-natured poetry.

Another relevant author of the era is Edmund Spenser who pushed the boundaries of

English poetry as a “prolific and daring experimenter” (Greenblatt, “Spenser” 411). As with

Sidney, there seems to be a threefold reality to the epic poetry that Spenser presents to the reader.

Spenser, in contrast to Sidney’s employment of the Petrarchan format, models his work after an

ancient poetic tradition. He uses ancient diction and centuries old poetic structures to root his

work in a larger literary history (Greenblatt, “Spenser” 414).

The Faerie Queene is arguably Spenser’s most prolific work: an unfinished set of dense

epic poetry about chivalric, knightly quests, written in a tight poetic structure. The piece is, first,

a successful work of fiction in its telling of knightly heroism, exciting adventure, and engaging

narrative. The fantastical storyline is rife with intrigue and dynamism – characters are often not

who they at first appear to be, and Spenser packs even the surface narrative with so many twists

and turns, it invites a second reading. The next level of appreciation for the piece is still baked in

at an eye-level. The names and nature of the characters, settings, and plot elements are blatant

allegories for a code of chivalric morality. In writing to a contemporary, Spenser claimed the

purpose of the piece: “’to fashion a gentleman or noble person in virtuous and gentle discipline’”
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(Greenblatt, “Spenser” 413). Each knightly protagonist is designed to embody one of six

principles for virtuous living. These are not, however, one-dimensional characters. Each

transcend the moral attribute of their namesake as they personify a universal human struggle

between their nominal virtue and its respective vice. Finally, beyond the complex narrative and

robust moral allegory, Spenser takes his literary opportunity to dip into the political realm.

Speaking of The Faerie Queene, the Norton Anthology of English Literature explains:

“Throughout the poem there is a dense network of allusions to events, issues, and particular

persons in England” (Greenblatt, “Spenser” 413). Spenser transcends his narrative by

incorporating the personalities and political landscape of his country into his narrative. For

example, both the Faerie Queene herself and a character named Belphoebe are representations of

Queen Elizabeth. Important issues touched on by the narrative include the European struggle

between Catholicism and Protestantism and England’s increasingly problematic colonial

relationship with Ireland (Greenblatt, “Spenser” 414).

Finally, it’s worth reviewing another example of Spenser’s literary finesse to analyze the

multi-dimensionality of the period’s poetry. The Epithalamion is a classical marriage blessing,

derived from Greek poetic tradition. As has already been seen, Spenser not only likes to generate

levels of literary meaning upward, but he enjoys building on centuries-old literary traditions to

even further enhance the depth of the pieces’ significance. The Norton Anthology of English

Literature calls the piece “a triumph of symbolic patterning” (Greenblatt, “Epithalamion” 488).

Spenser imbues the blessing with meaning all the way down to its harmonious poetic structures,

and all the way up to its sociopolitical commentary.

The strata of meaning begin with the complex stanza forms, and within these forms, the

subversion of an ancient convention. Spenser plays with the point of view of a traditional
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marriage blessing, combining the poet and the bridegroom to create a more personal narrative

account reminiscent of a Petrarchan exchange between Lover and Beloved (Greenblatt,

“Epithalamion” 488). Then, in the confines of the relevant poetic structure, Spenser begins to

build implicit moral assertions. There is, for example, very explicit expectation and presumption

the married couple to reproduce, a conspicuous nod to the moral conceptualization of sex

exclusively purposed for reproduction. There is also much praise of the Beloved’s inner beauty,

which is arguably as much description as it is prescription for the poem’s audience. Though the

poem is framed as a form of praise of preexisting virtue, Spenser means to inform his audience

what an ideal form of virtue is and how women should aim for it.

This can be taken yet one step further, in interpreting Spenser’s affirmation of marital and

reproductive virtues for women as a personal address to his “Virgin Queen”, whose chastity and

womanhood left English subjects uneasy. The prescriptive virtues can be seen as a grasp for

control over women under Elizabeth’s unprecedented reign. Marotti takes note of this trend

within poems of the era, saying: “In Elizabethan England, a female monarch, whose unmarried

state preserved her symbolic and real value in both domestic and international transactions

specifically encouraged the use of an amorous vocabulary by her courtiers to express ambition

and its vicissitudes” (Marotti 398). Members of Elizabeth’s court had a real reason to utilize the

metaphor of love and marriage in commentating political issues, for much of the gravity of

Elizabeth’s reign emanated from her femininity and marital status.

It’s been shown that Elizabethan era poetry exists on multiple planes of interpretation and

import simultaneously. Authors of the late 16th and early 17th centuries packed their poetry with

interpretive significance and tradition. The complexity of the poetry can be examined down to its
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relationship to ancient precedents, through its structural harmony, to it’s literal engaging

narratives, up into its commentary on virtuous living, and into the realm of political commentary.
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Work Cited

Greenblatt, Stephen, et al. “Amoretti and Epithalamion” The Norton Anthology of English

_____Literature, 10th ed., vol. 1, Norton, 2019, pp. 487–488.

---. “Edmund Spenser.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature, 10th ed., vol. 1, Norton,

_____2019, pp. 411–415.

---. “Elizabeth I.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature, 10th ed., vol. 1, Norton, 2019, pp.

_____403–404.

---. “Sir Philip Sidney.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature, 10th ed., vol. 1,

_____Norton, 2019, pp. 503–504.

Marotti, Arthur F. “‘Love Is Not Love’: Elizabethan Sonnet Sequences and the Social

_____Order.” ELH, vol. 49, no. 2, 1982, pp. 396–428. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2872989.

_____Accessed 20 Feb. 2020.