Spenser's Blatant Beast: The Thousand Tongues of Elizabethan Religious Polemic
This article addresses the final two books of the 1596 edition of Spenser's Faerie Queene, in which there arises a formidable adversary: the Blatant Beast. This monster, whose presence dominates the end of Book Five and a substantial portion of Book Six, represents the worst excesses of caustic...
| Published in: | Religions |
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| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
MDPI
[2017]
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| In: |
Religions
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| Further subjects: | B
Polemic
B Satire B Rhetoric B Allegory |
| Online Access: |
Presumably Free Access Volltext (Verlag) Volltext (doi) |
| Summary: | This article addresses the final two books of the 1596 edition of Spenser's Faerie Queene, in which there arises a formidable adversary: the Blatant Beast. This monster, whose presence dominates the end of Book Five and a substantial portion of Book Six, represents the worst excesses of caustic and satirical rhetoric as manifest in the theological and ecclesiastical pamphlet disputes that erupted after Fields and Wilcox's 1572 Admonition to Parliament. That these disputes were about serious and far-reaching matters is undeniable; it is also undeniable that the means by which these disputes were waged, especially in notorious cases like those of Martin Marprelate, caused significant intellectual, rhetorical, and religious anxiety among combatants and observers alike. Spenser's heavily allegorized presentation of polemic and pamphleteering in the figure of the Blatant Beastand the travails of the Knights of Justice and of Courtesy in bringing the beast to heelcan illustrate for students the full extent of that anxiety in Reformation England, as well as articulate Spenser's call for the timely application of well guided speech as the solution to these reckless disputes. |
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| ISSN: | 2077-1444 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Religions
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.3390/rel8040055 |