THE SHADOW TEXT
The Shadow Text is intended as no more than a lowly companion to the original. It makes no attempt to preserve metre or rhyme, but renders a prosaic version, unifying the spelling in order to make the meaning easier to understand.
I have altered the punctuation for the shadow version, though not without trepidation. My aim has been to make crystal clear the mechanical sense expressed by each stanza, but quite often this is impossible. For one thing, the original pointing, rather than being used strictly logically, may also influence the rhythm or emphasis of the words when spoken (and The Faerie Queene is a poem which should be read aloud—although perhaps not in its entirety!—to be fully appreciated). For another, the functions of the punctuation marks themselves have undergone change since Spenser's day. The semicolon, for example, is found in FQ introducing direct speech, where today a comma or a colon would be used. Again, the comma is often required to carry long parentheses, themselves sprinkled with commas; these passages can become very confusing, especially where Spenser has also adopted a contorted and latinistic word-order.
Then there are problems introduced by deliberately ambiguous pointing. Spenser's immense command of the language, and his quicksilver gift for wordplay and puns, allow him, when he chooses, to pack great complexities of meaning into a line or even a single word, and in this his punctuation is frequently his accomplice.
A famous example comes right at the beginning of Book I:
But on his brest a bloudie Crosse he bore,
The deare remembrance of his dying Lord,
For whose sweete sake that glorious badge he wore,
And dead as liuing euer him ador'd:
Is the meaning of line 4: "dead, as living, ever him adored", or: "dead, as living ever, him adored"? In fact, both meanings are probably intended.
Thus it cannot be overemphasized that, where ambiguity is occasioned by the punctuation of the original, the Shadow Text can do no more than propose what seems to me the more or most likely interpretation. Sometimes (as in the case cited above) I suggest alternatives, but the pointing of the original poem should always be given precedence in case of doubt.
The Glossary does not seek to interpret the poem. From time to time it hints at what lies behind the bare words in order to aid understanding, but its sole purpose is to make the language more accessible to the modern reader. Interpretation is left to the teacher, and to the large and growing body of criticism devoted to The Faerie Queene.