Actually I believe the whole of Elizabethan literature was composed
by Lytton Strachey based on a dream he had on the occasion of the
death of Queen Victoria. It was designed to create a myth of a
Golden Age of English letters, something that England badly needed in
the face of widespread unrest and disillusion at the end of
Victoria's reign. So Strachey, who was no friend of the Victorian
era, sat down and wrote a new literature that shows what poetry could
ACTUALLY have been like under an aging female monarch at the end of
an earlier century. The Shepherds' Calendar really refers to
mid-Victorian politics: Piers is Gladstone and Cuddye is Disraeli and
the arguments about Catholicism are actually about whether the
British Empire should pursue an agressive imperial policy in India or
not (of course all this is old hat by this time, but that's just the
point). Read the texts.
>Andy Green wrote:-
>> So, The Shepheardes Calender is casting the intentional spell. This list is
>> in danger of becoming both amusing and informative!
>
>He he he -- look at the postings up until a week ago!
>
>> Please let us continue. The Shepheardes Calender is the "manifesto" of an
>> English Renaissance - of which "The Faerie Queene" is but a minor part.
>
>I hope that discussion continues also -- it just took something controversial
>to start it off.
>
>> The Shepheardes Calender is, perhaps, not safe in the hands of Spenserian
>> Academia - where it is considered as a "juvenile" work, at best.
>
>It was the work of a juvenile, Andy -- his name was Christopher Marlowe
>and he was FOURTEEN. Spenser took him under his wing and got it
>published. He started school just before his fifteenth birthday but he had
>extra lessons in the holidays from Gabriel Harvey. Read the letters...
>
>> Spenser may well have been involved - but, I'm afraid, it's too good to have
>> beeen the work of Spenser alone.
>
>It was the work of a child prodigy who Spenser had every admiration for.
>Read the Spenser letter to Harvey which introduces it.
>
>> For the Spenserian Academia.... If you want a good undergraduate snigger,
>> then try Virgil. Not only were the young shepherds in danger (ooh! aagh!),
>> but also the sheep!
>
>The shepherd stuff really started when Sidney and Marlowe returned from the
>continent with the intention of recreating Arcadia -- and that's
>what they did.
>Sidney wrote a book about it....
>
>> If we are to move further we need Classicists, Poets, Musicians, Scientists,
>> Magicians, and even Spenserians.
>>
>> Should we take up the challenge here?
>
>My main interest here is sorting out what was and what was not Spenser's
>in the works of Spenser. We seem to have Marlowe, Bryskett, Mary Herbert
>and a few letters from Harvey -- who else is lurking in there?
>
>But I will join in elsewhere when I can :-)
>
>Peter Zenner
>
>+44 (0) 1246 271726
>Visit my web site 'Zenigmas' at
>http://www.pzenner.freeserve.co.uk
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