Meagan Abraham – I PYEJ
SPENSER AND SHAKESPEARE
SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES
Poets Edmund Spenser, and William Shakespeare acclaimed in the world of literature for their sonnets, each has their own precise styles.
Shakespeare’s works have been recorded and maintained in the form of manuscripts. Spenser, who was perhaps the most religious of the poets, Christianizes Neo-Platonism, applied his belief and faith to some of his work, as that of chaste marriage in Amoretti. And of course, Shakespeare, takes Neo-Platonism to a completely different level, picturing and describing a man instead of a woman, portraying woman extremely negatively in his Sonnets. Especially, in two of the poets work namely, Spenser’s 22, and Shakespeare’s 151, the poets explain their differences: Spenser according to his religious beliefs, Christianizes Neo-Platonic thought and applies it to his marriage; while Shakespeare instead decides to reject, even goes to the extreme of mocking those Neo-Platonic tradition and gives importance to the role of men while conveying an anti-traditional female image. Spenser refuses to focus restrictedly to a larger extent on Neo-Platonism in his simpler, more straightforward sonnets; However, when he does include Neo-Platonic thought, he makes it Christian, placing it in the context of chaste marriage. Spenser’s Sonnet 22, displays abundant Christian and altar imagery, tying it all to his wife and his transforming chaste desire for her. Opening with, “This holy season fit to fast and pray, / Men to devotion ought to be inclynd: / therefore, I lykewise on so holy day, / for my sweet Saynt some service fit will find” (1-4). Spenser aims to convey that men should have devotion, fast, and pray; his solution to this, his way of following this instruction (“therefore”), is that he will find “some service fit” for his “sweet Saynt.” Spenser is a steadfast believer that religious devotion is the equivalent of devotion and service to his wife, his “sweet Saynt”; and so therefore, almost honors his wife, depicting her as a saint or angel of sorts even. He goes on to write, “Her temple fayre is built within my mind” (5), repetitive of the religious image describing his wife. Her fair temple — perhaps indicative of her physical temple on her head but could very likely be a means of building worship— that resides deep in his mind. In this temple “her glorious ymage placed is, / on which my thoughts doo day and night attend / lyke sacred priests that never thinke amisse” (5-8). Spenser’s, contemplation of his wife’s “glorious ymage” occupies enormous amounts of time even endless and he mirrors this contemplation to that of “sacred priests,” again showing how he places his wife on the same level as the religious, holy things on which priests meditate. He also dubs his wife “th’author of my blisse” (9). This image in itself is absolutely Neo-Platonic: she writes his bliss; reading her, contemplating her, brings him happiness, transforms him. Spenser writes that he will build up an altar to appease this author of his blisse, “and on the same my hart will sacrifise, / burning in flames of pure and chast desire” (11-12). This idea of “pure and chast desire” is very significant and of great meaning to Spenser; it is this chaste, married love that transforms him. The sonnet is filled with religious imagery to express the colossal nature of this married love, with words such as “holy” (1), “Saynt” (4), “temple” (5), “glorious ymage” (6), “altar” (10), “sacrifise” (11), “goddesse” (13), and “relicks” (14). This religious love, almost worship for his wife transforms and alters him, showing that Spenser understands and acknowledges Neo-Platonism, but he manipulates it, melting and changing its original form by adding Christianity.
