Faerie Queene Analysis

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Cody Mowen

Professor Eisman

BritLit

10/25/15

The Faerie Queene Analysis

All throughout the history of literature authors have been given the

opportunity to express their own personal beliefs by using the art of literature through

propaganda and other various literary device techniques to persuade and inform the

audience about their personal principles, ethics, and opinions. In "The Faeire Queene" by

Edmund Spenser, all of the characters represent abstract ideas. Specifically, Britomart,

Redcrosse, Una, and Error. Throughout the poem, Spenser uses these allegorically

significant characters to illustrate the "proper religion" (Protestantism) as well as the

"flawed religion" (Catholicism). Thus, the poem has a thoughtful purpose behind its

extravagant characters.

Britomart is a talented combatant who is able to maintain her notorious

composure in difficult situations throughout the poem. She is also the hero of Book 3 of

the poem and she represents herself as a female warrior virgin who provides a theme of

chastity to the poem. Spenser directly states this in his Letter of the Authors: "The third

of Britomartis a Lady knight, in whome I picture Chastity"(779). Chih-hsin Lin in his

analysis of the poem wrote, "The sixteenth-century Protestants talk about both the

necessity and sanctity of marriage and sex: they call marriage honorable without

forgetting that sex is an important, even essential, part of marriage"(par 7). By providing

the poem with context to prove that her character represents chastity, the audience can

mowen

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see that this is a vital element of Protestantism and therefore, Britomart's allegorical

significance to chastity is a direct representation to Protestantism, which promotes the

"true religion".

Redcrosse is a knight and the hero of Book 1 of the poem; he represents the virtue

of holiness. Spenser directly states this in his Letter of the Authors: "The...