THE FORM OF THE POEM
The basic unit of the poem is a verse or stanza made up of nine lines. This "Spenserian stanza", much imitated (for example, by Byron), is Spenser's own invention. Typically, it consists of eight pentameters and a final alexandrine. Lines are sometimes short or long, on occasion perhaps through typographical error (see for example II iii 26.9), but at other times for deliberate effect (e.g. III iv 39.7, IV i 3).
The rhyming scheme is generally ababbcbcc, though this too is subject to change, whether by authorial oversight or authorial intention (e.g. II ii 7, VII vii 28).
The stanzas are not numbered in the original editions.
Between 30 and 87 stanzas comprise a canto (Italian, "song"), a term borrowed from Lodovico Ariosto, the Italian poet, whose work influenced Spenser.
A canto is preceded by a four-line verse called an argument. This summarizes what follows, often with particular emphasis on its allegorical meaning. The metre of the argument is that of the Book of Common Prayer.
Each complete book is introduced by a proem, a group of between four and eleven stanzas preceding the argument of Canto i.
Twelve cantos comprise a book. Book VII is incomplete.
Spenser's stated plan was to write twelve books, one on each of the twelve moral or private virtues; it is not known whether he composed any more of The Faerie Queene than has survived. The Faerie Queene was to have been followed by another epic poem of twelve more books, one on each of the political or public virtues. No trace of this work has ever been found.