READING THE ALLEGORICAL INTERTEXT This page intentionally left blank READING THE ALLEGORICAL INTERTEXT Chaucer, Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton (cid:1) Judith H. Anderson FordhamUniversityPress NewYork 2008 Copyright(cid:1)2008FordhamUniversityPress Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced,storedin aretrievalsystem,ortransmittedinanyformorbyanymeans—electronic, mechanical,photocopy,recording,oranyother—exceptforbriefquotations inprintedreviews,withoutthepriorpermissionofthepublisher. LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData Anderson,JudithH. Readingtheallegoricalintertext:Chaucer,Spenser,Shakespeare, Milton/JudithH.Anderson.—1sted. p. cm. Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex. ISBN-13:978-0-8232-2847-8(cloth:alk.paper) 1.Englishliterature—Historyandcriticism—Theory,etc. 2.Spenser, Edmund,1552?–1599.Faeriequeene. 3.Chaucer,Geoffrey,d.1400. Canterburytales. 4.Shakespeare,William,1564–1616.KingLear. 5.Milton,John,1608–1674—Criticismandinterpretation. 6.Inter- textuality. 7.Symbolisminliterature. 8.Influence(Literary,artistic, etc.) I.Title. PR21.A85 2008 820.9(cid:1)15—dc22 2008003833 PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica Firstedition For Sarah Massey-Warren, who will read from within the fullness of the intertext This page intentionally left blank Contents PriorPublication ix Introduction:ReadingtheAllegoricalIntertext 1 Part 1: Allegorical Reflections ofTheCanterbury TalesinTheFaerieQueene 1. Chaucer’sandSpenser’sReflexiveNarrators 27 2. WhatComesafterChaucer’sButinTheFaerieQueene 42 3. ‘‘Prickingontheplaine’’:Spenser’sIntertextual BeginningsandEndings 54 4. Allegory,Irony,Despair:Chaucer’sPardoner’sand Franklin’sTalesandSpenser’sFaerieQueene,BooksIand III 61 5. Eumnestes’‘‘immortallscrine’’:Spenser’sArchive 79 6. Spenser’sUseofChaucer’sMelibee:Allegory,Narrative, History 91 Part 2: Agency, Allegory, and History within the Spenserian Intertext 7. Spenser’sMuiopotmosandChaucer’sNun’sPriest’sTale 109 8. ArthurandArgante:ParodyingtheIdealVision 126 9. Chaucer’sParliamentofFowlsandRefractionsofaVeiled VenusinTheFaerieQueene 135 10. TheAntiquitiesofFairylandandIreland 154 11. Betteramischiefthananinconvenience:‘‘Thesaiyingself’’in Spenser’sViewofthePresentStateofIreland 168 Part 3: Spenserian Allegory in the Intertexts of Shakespeare and Milton 12. TheConspiracyofRealism:ImpasseandVisioninThe FaerieQueeneandShakespeare’sKingLear 183 vii viii Contents 13. VenusandAdonis:Spenser,Shakespeare,andtheFormsof Desire 201 14. FlowersandBoars:SurmountingSexualBinarismin Spenser’sGardenofAdonis 214 15. AndrocentrismandAcrasianFantasiesintheBowerof Bliss 224 16. BeyondBinarism:Eros/DeathandVenus/MarsinAntony andCleopatraandTheFaerieQueene 239 17. PatienceandPassioninShakespeareandMilton 259 18. ‘‘RealorAllegoric’’inHerbertandMilton:Thinking throughDifference 272 19. SpenserandMilton:TheMind’sAllegoricalPlace 280 Notes 321 Index 423 Prior Publication (in wholeorin substantialpart) ‘‘NarrativeReflections:Re-envisagingthePoetinTheCanterburyTalesand The Faerie Queene,’’ in Refiguring Chaucer in the Renaissance, ed. Theresa M. Krier (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1998), 87–105: now entitled‘‘Chaucer’sandSpenser’sReflexiveNarrators.’’ ‘‘What Comesafter Chaucer’sBut: AdversativeConstructions in Spenser,’’ in Acts of Interpretation: The Text in Its Contexts, ed. Mary J. Carruthers and Elizabeth D. Kirk (Norman, Okla.: Pilgrim, 1982), 105–18: now entitled‘‘WhatComesafterChaucer’sButinTheFaerieQueene.’’ ‘‘‘A Gentle Knight was pricking on the plaine’: The Chaucerian Connec- tion,’’ English Literary Renaissance, 15 (1985), 166–74: now entitled ‘‘‘Pricking on the plaine’: Spenser’s Intertextual Beginnings and End- ings’’((cid:1)Blackwell/Wiley). ‘‘Allegory, Irony, Despair: Chaucer’s Pardoner’s and Franklin’s Tales and Spenser’s Faerie Queene, Books I and III,’’ in Textual Conversations in the Renaissance:Ethics,Authors,andTechnologies,ed.ZacharyLesserandBen- edictRobinson(Aldershot,Hampshire,U.K.:Ashgate,2006),71–89. ‘‘‘Myn auctour’: Spenser’s Enabling Fiction and Eumnestes’ ‘immortall scrine,’’’inUnfoldedTales:StudiesinRenaissanceRomance,ed.GeorgeM. Logan and Gordon Teskey (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1989), 16–31: now entitled ‘‘Eumnestes’ ‘immortall scrine’: Spenser’s Archive.’’ ‘‘Prudenceand HerSilence: Spenser’sUseof Chaucer’sMelibee,’’ ELH, 62 (1995), 29–46: now entitled ‘‘Spenser’s Use of Chaucer’s Melibee: Alle- gory,Narrative,History’’((cid:1)JohnsHopkinsUniversityPress). ‘‘‘Natworthaboterflye’:MuiopotmosandTheNun’sPriest’sTale,’’Journalof Medievaland RenaissanceStudies,1 (1971), 89–106:now entitled ‘‘Spens- er’s Muiopotmos and Chaucer’s Nun’s Priest’s Tale’’ ((cid:1) Duke University Press). ‘‘Arthur,Argante,andtheIdealVision:AnExerciseinSpeculationandPar- ody,’’ in The Passing of Arthur: New Essays in Arthurian Tradition, ed. ix