Written by a team of international experts, the forty-two essays in
The Oxford Handbook of Edmund Spenser examine the entire canon of
Spenser's work and the social and intellectual environments in
which it was produced, providing new readings of the texts,
extensive analysis of former criticism, and up-to-date
bibliographies. Section I, 'Contexts', elucidates the circumstances
in which the poetry and prose were written, and suggests some of
the major political, social, and professional issues with which the
work engages. Section 2, 'Works', presents a series of new readings
of the canon informed by the most recent scholarship. Section 3,
'Poetic Craft', provides a detailed analysis of what Spenser termed
the poet's 'cunning', the linguistic, rhetorical, and stylistic
skills that distinguish his writing. Section 4, 'Sources and
Influences', examines a wide range of subtexts, intertexts ,and
analogues that contextualise the works within the literary
conventions, traditions and genres upon which Spenser draws and not
infrequently subverts. Section 5, 'Reception', grapples with the
issue of Spenser's effect on succeeding generations of editors,
writers, painters, and book-illustrators, while also attempting to
identify the most salient and influential strands in the critical
tradition. The volume serves as both companion and herald to the
Oxford University Press edition of Spenser's Complete Works. No
'agreed' view of Spenser emerges from this work or is intended to.
The contributors approach the texts from a variety of viewpoints
and employ diverse methods of critical interpretation with a view
to stimulating informed discussion and future scholarship.
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