Charles Butler's post reminds me of Stephen Orgel's discussion of the early
17-century marginalia in a copy of FQ that he owns. The Puritan revaluation
of faerie clearly informs these marginal notes, which include some
indignation early in Book I: doesn't this writer know that all faeries are
demons?!
I suppose it's a big leap, but one trajectory for this whole problem would
lead us to Milton, who invokes the spiritual ambiguity of the faerie world
pretty strikingly at the end of his own first book. It's striking because
Paradise Lost tends so to polarize good and evil so impressively; but when
Milton wants to evoke human uncertainty about the supernatural, he turns to
that figure of the moonlit rustic laborer, distracted on his way home by
something that might be the dance of the faeries. The location of this
simile just at that point in the narrative when the Satanic powers are
gathering in supreme council is ominous, to say the least, but the
indirectness of the connection is also interesting. Although he suspends it
in the hypothetical status of a simile, Milton seems to want the beguiling
atmosphere of folk imagination, half-magical and half-superstitious, as much
as he wants the Puritan judgment on such matters.
-----Original Message-----
From: Sidney-Spenser Discussion List
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Charles Butler
Sent: Tuesday, November 18, 2003 5:01 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: forward from Thomas Herron
Katharine Briggs' ever-useful *Dictionary of Fairies* is interesting on
Hobgoblins, though rather tantalizingly so. It points out that the word was
originally applied, somewhat affectionately, to mischievous or brownie-type
spirits, as in *Midsummer Night's Dream* ('Those that Hobgoblin call you,
and sweet Puck,/ You do their work, and they shall have good luck'), and
that its application to wicked spirits was a Puritan usage: she gives the
example of Bunyan's 'Hobgoblin nor foul fiend'.
If we accept that basic distinction it seems probable that Harvey's
Hobgoblin/Apollo comparison belongs to the first type, garland-stealing
being the kind of thing that might be expected of a mischievous Puck, and
Spenser's later drery-accented frayers to the second. We could have fun
speculating whether this indicates a definitive shift in usage between the
composition of the two texts, or a distinction between Harvey's and
Spenser's religious affiliations, but more likely both meanings were
current, and either could be used depending on context, as was certainly the
case with a word like 'fairy'.
I wonder, incidentally, whether Anne's demons are specifically incubi and
succubi (certainly an object of fascinaton for Spenser, and a worldwide
phenomenon as far as I can see, though their activities don't form part of
the hobgoblin's usual job description), or workers of more general-purpose
marriage-wrecking illusions?
Charlie
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