Faerie Queen Essay

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The Faerie Queene
Edmund Spenser
The Bower of Bliss and The Garden of Adonis by Ian Mackean So passeth, in the passing of a day,
Of mortall life the leafe, the bud, the flowre,
Ne more doth flourish after first decay,
That earst was sought to decke both bed and bowre,
Of many a Ladie, and many a Paramowre:
Gather therefore the Rose, whilest yet is prime,
For soone comes age, that will her pride deflowre:
Gather the Rose of love, whilest yet is time,
Whilest loving thou mayest loved be with equall crime.

[Edmund Spenser (I552-I599): The Faerie Queene II.XII.75]
The Bower of Bliss[1] and the Garden of Adonis[2] might look similar from a distance; their geographical form is certainly similar, and the tour on which Spenser takes us seems to follow the same kind of route. But their ostensible similarity, and their juxtaposition in two adjacent books of The Faerie Queene only serve to highlight their differences. The two gardens represent very different qualities of human life, and Spenser indicates the differences visually in his description of the gardens, verbally in the words he uses in these descriptions, and dramatically in the kinds of activity that take place in the gardens.

The first distinction to be made is between the proportion of Art to Nature that has gone into the construction of the gardens. The 'Bowre of Blisse' is introduced as:
A place pickt out by choice of best alive,
That natures worke by art can imitate: [II.XII.42]
Art itself is not being condemned, but the use of art to stimulate wasteful unproductive lust. The artifice of the garden is in fact admired for its skill, but condemned for being used to excess.
And them amongst, some were of burnisht gold,
So made by art, to beautifie the rest,
. . . That the weake bowes, with so rich load opprest,
Did bow adowne, as over-burdened. [II.XII.55]
The image of the vine bending
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