Hi Penny,
Not particularly queasy. About as queasy as when Spenser writes, at FQ
II.iv.15, that Furor 'his teeth did grind/ And grimly gnash', or when he
writes at FQ I.iv.25 of Lechery that 'in a greene gowne he clothed was
full faire', or when he writes at III.xii.45 (in 1590) that Amoret's body
is now 'the sweet lodge of love and deare delight': I don't think, on the
basis of this evidence, that Spenser's poetry was written by Nashe,
Greene, or Lodge.
'Shaked' is a common variant on 'shook' in the early modern period, part
of a process of drift, abortive in this case, in English from the strong
to the weak form of the past tense; so it doesn't surprise me that someone
would, in speaking of a spear, say that it was being 'shaked'. I take this
spear-shaking to be a bawdy joke about 'queint Bellona' and men playing
women in Tudor entertainments and stage-plays.
If it sounded like I was being dismissive about acrostics in my last
email, I have to apologize, because I wasn't: I think this is just the
kind of game played by poets like Spenser, who of course demonstrates a
serious respect for numerology in Amoretti and Epithalamion.
andrew
> Out of interest, how do you feel when you read 'shaked her speare at
> him' in an October gloss? Queasy? Penny.
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