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Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 12th, 2009, 2:08 am
by Larry W.

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 12th, 2009, 7:10 am
by agingjb
Shakespeare is usually presented with conventional "modern" spelling, which works well enough. If you look at an original text Shakespeare, then virtually every "different" word is easily seen to be roughly equivalent to its modern form:

"to dye, to sleepe/ No more; and by a sleepe, to say we end/ The Heart-ake, and the thousand Naturall shockes/ That Flesh is heyre too?"

but then we are very familiar with Shakespeare, and in any case he was partly (with Tyndale) responsible for modern English.

In the case of Chaucer the language is perceptibly different. It does make some sense to translate Chaucer - going beyond respelling. Chaucer wrote, of course, before printing.

In the case of Spenser, I suppose that he is right on the border. I can certainly see a case for a "modern spelling" edition for those words that do retain, approximately, their meaning. A personal note: I find the exchange between "v"s and "u"s in my Penguin Faerie Queene much more obvious, and slightly jarring, than any other variation in spelling.

I've always been curious about the extent to which Dante, before Chaucer and long before printing, is, I assume, completely accessible to modern Italians.

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 20th, 2009, 11:57 am
by Adam Linton

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 23rd, 2009, 5:33 pm
by rumzy

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 23rd, 2009, 5:35 pm
by Adam Linton

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 23rd, 2009, 5:43 pm
by rumzy
By the way, I just bought The Faerie Queen to read for the first time. Is anyone else reading it right now? I'd love to hear your thoughts as you go along.

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 23rd, 2009, 5:47 pm
by Adam Linton

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 24th, 2009, 6:11 pm
by Adam Linton

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 27th, 2009, 1:41 am
by Tuke

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 27th, 2009, 10:13 am
by Adam Linton

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 27th, 2009, 11:17 pm
by rumzy
Ok, here is my first question: Spenser calls the Redcross Knight an "Elfe," but then identifies him as Saint George in Canto II. Did Elfin mean the same thing in 16th century literature as it did in 20th century literature like Lord of the Rings?

By the way, does anyone know of a good audio recording of The Faerie Queen?

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: October 28th, 2009, 1:22 am
by Adam Linton

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: November 9th, 2009, 3:05 am
by Acrux

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: March 8th, 2010, 11:36 am
by ladysherlockian
I am writing MA about the fairies in Shakespeare's comedies. Apart from what we include in our bibliographies, we have to read some additional books and articles for the exam. They have to be related to the topic of our thesis. I was wondering about The Faerie Queene, would it be appropriate? It features fairies, but I know that Spenser deliberately made the language more archaic than the one used in his times. I guess it must be difficult to read. Would it be really feasible to read it and understand in detail before my exams in June?

Re: Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queen

PostPosted: March 8th, 2010, 9:22 pm
by Adam Linton