While The Faerie Queene counts as his masterpiece, it is in his shorter poetry that Edmund Spenser (c. 1552-99) showed his supreme versatility and skill as eulogist, satirist, pastoral poet and prophet.
The Shepheardes Calender marks a turning point in literary history, as the anonymous author confidently asserts his faith in the native vigour of the English language and stakes his claim to be the successor of Virgil and Chaucer. The Amoretti and Fowre Hymnes reveal an acute sense of how erotic and even religious love are shot through with vanity and narcissism. Mother Hubberds Tale - an Elizabethan Animal Farm - savagely satirizes the sexual jealousy and political disarray at the heart of the Queen's court. And even the Epithalamion, a rare celebration of consummated desire, is offset by far darker echoes.
This new Penguin Enlish Poets edition contains all Spenser's English poetry apart from The Faerie Queene, as well as his Latin verse (together with a full translation). Detailed notes illuminate his many allusions to biblical, classical and contemporary literature.
The Shorter Poems
Illustrations
Chronology
Introduction
From A Theatre for Worldlings
Epigrams
Sonets
The Shepheardes Calender
Januarye
Februarie
March
Aprill
Maye
June
Julye
August
September
October
Nouember
December
From Letters (1580)
Complaints
The Ruines of Time
The Teares of the Muses
Virgils Gnat
Prosopopoia. Or Mother Hubberds Tale
Ruines of Rome: by Bellay
Mviopotmos
Visions of the Worlds Vanitie
The Visions of Bellay
The Visions of Petrarch
Daphnaïda
Colin Clovts Come Home Againe
Colin Clovts Come Home Againe
Astrophel
Dolefull Lay of Clorinda
Amoretti and Epithalamion
Amoretti
Anacreontics
Epithalamion
Fowre Hymnes
An Hymne in Honovr of Love
An Hymne in Honovr of Beavtie
An Hymne of Heavenly Love
An Hymne of Heavenly Beavtie
Prothalamion
Commendatory Sonnets
Attributed Verses
Notes; Abbreviations
Glossary of Common Terms
Textual Apparatus
Further Reading
'Spenser's shorter poems ... are among the most important bodies of late Elizabethan verse, but have remained in the shadow of their author's magnum opus, The Fairie Queene. It is hoped that Richard A. McCabe's excellent new edition will help to transform their fortune' Andrew Hadfield, TLS
