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Spenser's Imitations from Ariosto

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

R. E. Neil Dodge
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Extract

The influence of the Orlando Furioso on Spenser's Faery Queen has long been recognized. Warton, in his excellent Observations, devoted a section to it, and others have here and there remarked upon the affinity of the two poems. I cannot find, however, that any writer has yet given the subject more than casual attention. The reasons for this neglect are, of course, not far to seek. Men read and study the Faery Queen, and men read and study the Orlando Furioso, but few care to read and study them side by side, with the obligation of going through the Morgante Maggiore, the Orlando Innamorato, Rinaldo, and the Oerusalemme Liberata, for casual reference and general illustration. The Faery Queen, as it stands, is nearly twice as long as the Odyssey, the Orlando Furioso is longer than the Faery Queen, and the others are of varying, but always substantial bulk—a rather formidable array. Moreover, despite vast differences of spirit and method, these poems deal with the same subject-matter, romantic chivalry; and too steady converse with romantic chivalry is, to say the least, not stimulating. In view of such conditions and of the work already done by Warton, critics may very probably have felt that further labor in this field would hardly be worth while.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 12 , Issue 2 , 1897 , pp. 151 - 204
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1897

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References

page 152 note 1 For this passage and the following v. Dr. Grosart's edition of Spenser, vol. ix, pp. 274 and 277.

page 153 note 1 It is after Mantuan.

page 160 note 1 G. B. Pigna: I Romanzi. Venice, 1554, pp. 44, 65.

page 160 note 2 Though not directly bearing on Spenser's early emulation of Ariosto, this phase of Ariosto criticism in Italy is too significant and important to be omitted.

page 161 note 1 Tasso: Opere. Venice, 1735, v. iii, p. 155.

page 161 note 2 G. B. Giraldi: De’ Romanzi; in the Biblioteca Rara, v. 52, p. 64.

page 167 note 1 v. Bk. iii, c. 10, st. 48.

page 168 note 1 This point is discussed later.

page 172 note 1 The episode is strung out over three cantos: I, 72-81; II, 1-23; VIII, 29 ff.

page 180 note 1 Braggadochio had formerly won her for his lady (Bk. iii, c. 8, st. 11-14), as Mandricardo won Doralice (O. F., xiv, 38 ff.), but he had immediately lost her through cowardice. His exploit in winning her might be regarded as a burlesque of Mandricardo's exploit.

page 181 note 1 I use the term “situation” in a somewhat loose sense.

page 185 note 1 See, however, Chaucer: The Book of the Duchesse, ll. 153 ff. Also Ovid: Metam., xi, 591 ff. Statius: Theb., x, 84 ff.

page 195 note 1 Those who read Spenser attentively will hardly be convinced, I think, that there was “a life-long vein of melancholy” in him. v. Dr. Grosart's Spenser, vol. i, p. 185.

page 196 note 1 Sometimes he superimposes Tasso upon Ariosto—not always felicitously. What Britomart says of her early training in arms (Bk. iii, c. 2, st. 6, 7) is imitated from Clorinda (G. L., ii, 39, 40), but is in manifest contradiction to Glaucè's words (c. 3, st. 53, 57).