Or, Spenser paints in words. Discuss.
Answer: Spenser is one of the renowned pictorial artists in English poetry and his pictures are life-like and colourful. Although he was not a painter, he could paint with words colourful and decorative pictures quite in the style of the European painters. The Faeric Queene is a picture gallery with luxurious richness and colourful decorations. When we read it, we pass through an enchanted landscape in which there is a dream-like succession of pageants and dissolving views of forests, lakes, caves, and palaces. Spenser draws imagery from various sources, such as (a) Elizabethan court pageants, masques, festive dances (b) Elizabethan furnitures, tapestries, etc. (c) Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso, Ovid’s Metamorphoses and Virgil’s Eclogues and (d) The Bible.
In Spenser’s pictorical art and imagery, Nature and landscapes always play a prominent part. The picture of the rising sun has been protrayed in the conventional style.
“At last, the golden oriental gate
Of greatest heaven, gan to open fire,
And Phoebus fresh as bridegroom to his mate
Came dancing forth, shaking his dewy hair
And hurled his glittering beams through gloomy air.”
Spenser does not avoid the world of human beings. He has drawn concrete and realistic pictures of Knights, ladies, queens, heroes, and warriors. For example, we get a wonderful picture of a Medieval kinght in the figure of the Red Cross Knight as described by the poet. “A gentle knight was pricking on the plaine.” The Red Cross Knight riding on the horse was of noble birth. On his breast, he bore a bloody cross as a token of his love and allegiance to Jesus Christ who had died on the Cross. The sign of the Cross was also inscribed on his shield. He was a follower of Christ both in word and deed. The medieval institution of knight-errantry had a peculiar fascination for Spenser and we get impressions and detailed word-paintings of scenes of fighting, knightly encounters, and bloodshed.
Spenser shows himself at his best when freed from the need of describing a scene or object in actual existence. He gives free rein to his imagination when dealing with the objects of his own creation. On such occasions, he seems to experience a peculiar joy as he bathes his fanciful creations in the light and colour and shade of his own choice. Such is the joyful creation of Lucifera’s stately palace built of squared brick (i. iv. 4)
Spenser’s word pictures are usually elaborate and developed at full length with every minute detail, worked to its widest span. He is an artist who knows where he has to restrain his verse and content himself by touching upon a significant detail or two leaving the manifold details of the picture to the imagination of his reader. Some of the most impressive pictures are those of his monstrous creatures. One of these is the dreadful dragon.
“That with his largeness measured much land over cast” (I.XI. 8)
Each part of this terrible creature’s massive body is described with so strong strokes that in the end, a full picture emerges beast, terrible and yet attractive, free and yet of a hypnotizing aspect. This beast has a body monstrous, horrible, and vast, swollen with “wrath and poyson, and with bloody gore” and covered all over with brazen scales that made a terrifying noise like that of the clashing of an armour bright. This picture of his monster would not be complete unless he gives a description of the most vital and terrorizing parts of his body, namely his eyes which “Like two bright shining shields, did burn with wrath, and sparkled living fire.” Spenser has painted the beauty of nature. He has given vivid pictures of beasts and giants, but when he comes to delineating ugliness or evoking disgust or dread by representing horror in its most impressive aspect, he seems to put forth all the power of his poetic language. The portrait of Archimago is presented in such a way that apparently he seems simple but full of treacherous guile, knitting, the snare of his villainous mischief, while professing holiness and piety.
Spenser is skilled in presenting the abstract in concrete forms. The pictures of Gluttony, Avarice, Anger, Envy, Despair are as concrete and detailed as those of any painter. Lavish imagery verbal or conventional as well as visual is Spenser’s natural mode of poetic utterance. In the poetic description, sound imagery is the natural accompaniment of word painting. The Faerie Queene is peopled with noise and sound. So, Spenser introduces vocal and instrumental music in his imagery and this was the demand of the age. In image-making power, his superiority to his contemporary poets is one of degree, resulting from a finer sensibility and a wider range of appeal which have strengthened his position as the poet’s poet.
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