The works of Richard Hurd, volume 4 (of 8)

by Richard Hurd

LETTER VIII.

I spoke “of criticizing Spenser’s poem under the idea, not of a classical, but Gothic composition.”

It is certain, much light might be thrown on that singular work, were an able critic to consider it in this view. For instance, he might go some way towards explaining, perhaps justifying, the general plan and conduct of the Fairy Queen, which, to classical readers, has appeared indefensible.

I have taken the fancy, with your leave, to try my hand on this curious subject.

When an architect examines a Gothic structure by Grecian rules, he finds nothing but deformity. But the Gothic architecture has its own rules, by which when it comes to be examined, it is seen to have its merit, as well as the Grecian. The question is not, which of the two is conducted in the simplest or truest taste: but whether there be not sense and design in both, when scrutinized by the laws on which each is projected.

The same observation holds of the two sorts of poetry. Judge of the Fairy Queen by the classic models, and you are shocked with its disorder: consider it with an eye to its Gothic original, and you find it regular. The unity and simplicity of the former are more complete: but the latter has that sort of unity and simplicity, which results from its nature.

The Fairy Queen then, as a Gothic poem, derives its METHOD, as well as the other characters of its composition, from the established modes and ideas of Chivalry.

It was usual, in the days of knight-errantry, at the holding of any great feast, for knights to appear before the prince, who presided at it, and claim the privilege of being sent on any adventure to which the solemnity might give occasion. For it was supposed that, when such a throng of knights and barons bold, as Milton speaks of, were got together, the distressed would flock in from all quarters, as to a place where they knew they might find and claim redress for all their grievances.

This was the real practice, in the days of pure and ancient Chivalry. And an image of this practice was afterwards kept up in the castles of the great, on any extraordinary festival or solemnity: of which, if you want an instance, I refer you to the description of a feast made at Lisle in 1453, in the court of Philip the good, duke of Burgundy, for a Crusade against the Turks: as you may find it given at large in the memoirs of Matthieu de Conci, Olivier de la Marche, and Monstrelet.

That feast was held for twelve days: and each day was distinguished by the claim and allowance of some adventure.

Now, laying down this practice as a foundation for the poet’s design, you will see how properly the Fairy Queen is conducted.

----“I devise,” says the poet himself in his letter to Sir W. Raleigh, “that the Fairy Queen kept her annual feaste xii days: upon which xii several days, the occasions of the xii several adventures happened; which being undertaken by xii several knights, are in these xii books severally handled.”

Here you have the poet delivering his own method, and the reason of it. It arose out of the order of his subject. And would you desire a better reason for his choice?

Yes; you will say, a poet’s method is not that of his subject. I grant you, as to the order of time, in which the recital is made; for here, as Spenser observes (and his own practice agrees to the rule), lies the main difference between the poet historical, and the historiographer: the reason of which is drawn from the nature of Epic composition itself, and holds equally let the subject be what it will, and whatever the system of manners be, on which it is conducted. Gothic or Classic makes no difference in this respect.

But the case is not the same with regard to the general plan of a work, or what may be called the order of distribution, which is and must be governed by the subject-matter itself. It was as requisite for the Fairy Queen to consist of the adventures of twelve Knights, as for the Odyssey to be confined to the adventures of one Hero: justice had otherwise not been done to his subject.

So that if you will say any thing against the poet’s method, you must say that he should not have chosen this subject. But this objection arises from your classic ideas of Unity, which have no place here; and are in every view foreign to the purpose, if the poet has found means to give his work, though consisting of many parts, the advantage of Unity. For in some reasonable sense or other, it is agreed, every work of art must be one, the very idea of a work requiring it.

If you ask then, what is this Unity of Spenser’s Poem? I say, It consists in the relation of its several adventures to one common original, the appointment of the Fairy Queen; and to one common end, the completion of the Fairy Queen’s injunctions. The knights issued forth on their adventures on the breaking up of this annual feast: and the next annual feast, we are to suppose, is to bring them together again from the atchievement of their several charges.

This, it is true, is not the classic Unity, which consists in the representation of one entire action: but it is an Unity of another sort, an unity resulting from the respect which a number of related actions have to one common purpose. In other words, it is an unity of design, and not of action.

This Gothic method of design in poetry may be, in some sort, illustrated by what is called the Gothic method of design in gardening. A wood or grove cut out into many separate avenues or glades was among the most favourite of the works of art, which our fathers attempted in this species of cultivation. These walks were distinct from each other, had each their several destination, and terminated on their own proper objects. Yet the whole was brought together and considered under one view, by the relation which these various openings had, not to each other, but to their common and concurrent center. You and I are, perhaps, agreed that this sort of gardening is not of so true a taste as that which Kent and Nature have brought us acquainted with; where the supreme art of the designer consists in disposing his ground and objects into an entire landskip; and grouping them, if I may use the term, in so easy a manner, that the careless observer, though he be taken with the symmetry of the whole, discovers no art in the combination:

In lieto aspetto il bel giardin s’aperse,
Acque stagnanti, mobili cristalli,
Fior vari, e varie piante, herbe diverse,
Apriche collinette, ombrose valli,
Selve, e spelunche in UNA VISTA offerse:
E quel, che’l bello, e’l caro accresce à l’opre,
L’arte, che tutto sà, nulla si scopre.
Tasso, C. XVI. s. ix.

This, I say, may be the truest taste in gardening, because the simplest: yet there is a manifest regard to unity in the other method; which has had its admirers, as it may have again, and is certainly not without its design and beauty.

But to return to our poet. Thus far he drew from Gothic ideas; and these ideas, I think, would lead him no further. But, as Spenser knew what belonged to classic composition, he was tempted to tie his subject still closer together by one expedient of his own, and by another taken from his classic models.

His own was, to interrupt the proper story of each book, by dispersing it into several; involving by this means, and as it were intertwisting the several actions together, in order to give something like the appearance of one action to his twelve adventures. And for this conduct, as absurd as it seems, he had some great examples in the Italian poets, though, I believe, they were led into it by different motives.

The other expedient, which he borrowed from the classics, was, by adopting one superior character, which should be seen throughout. Prince Arthur, who had a separate adventure of his own, was to have his part in each of the other; and thus several actions were to be embodied by the interest which one principal Hero had in them all. It is even observable, that Spenser gives this adventure of Prince Arthur, in quest of Gloriana, as the proper subject of his poem. And upon this idea the late learned editor of the Fairy Queen has attempted, but, I think, without success, to defend the unity and simplicity of its fable. The truth was, the violence of classic prejudices forced the poet to affect this appearance of unity, though in contradiction to his Gothic system. And, as far as we can judge of the tenour of the whole work from the finished half of it, the adventure of Prince Arthur, whatever the author pretended, and his critic too easily believed, was but an after-thought; and, at least, with regard to the historical fable, which we are now considering, was only one of the expedients by which he would conceal the disorder of his Gothic plan.

And if this was his design, I will venture to say that both his expedients were injudicious. Their purpose was, to ally two things, in nature incompatible, the Gothic, and the classic unity; the effect of which misalliance was to discover and expose the nakedness of the Gothic.

I am of opinion then, considering the Fairy Queen as an epic or narrative poem constructed on Gothic ideas, that the poet had done well to affect no other unity than that of design, by which his subject was connected. But his poem is not simply narrative; it is throughout allegorical: he calls it a perpetual allegory or dark conceit: and this character, for reasons I may have occasion to observe hereafter, was even predominant in the Fairy Queen. His narration is subservient to his moral, and but serves to colour it. This he tells us himself at setting out,

Fierce wars and faithful loves shall moralize my song;

that is, shall serve for a vehicle, or instrument to convey the moral.

Now under this idea, the Unity of the Fairy Queen is more apparent. His twelve knights are to exemplify as many virtues, out of which one illustrious character is to be composed. And in this view the part of Prince Arthur in each book becomes essential, and yet not principal; exactly, as the poet has contrived it. They who rest in the literal story, that is, who criticize it on the footing of a narrative poem, have constantly objected to this management. They say, it necessarily breaks the unity of design. Prince Arthur, they affirm, should either have had no part in the other adventures, or he should have had the chief part. He should either have done nothing, or more. This objection I find insisted upon by Spenser’s best critic[49]; and, I think, the objection is unanswerable; at least, I know of nothing that can be said to remove it, but what I have supposed above might be the purpose of the poet, and which I myself have rejected as insufficient.

But how faulty soever this conduct be in the literal story, it is perfectly right in the moral: and that for an obvious reason, though his critics seem not to have been aware of it. His chief hero was not to have the twelve virtues in the degree in which the knights had, each of them, their own (such a character would be a monster;) but he was to have so much of each as was requisite to form his superior character. Each virtue, in its perfection, is exemplified in its own knight; they are all, in a due degree, concentrated in Prince Arthur.

This was the poet’s moral: and what way of expressing this moral in the history, but by making Prince Arthur appear in each adventure, and in a manner subordinate to its proper hero? Thus, though inferior to each in his own specific virtue, he is superior to all by uniting the whole circle of their virtues in himself: and thus he arrives, at length, at the possession of that bright form of Glory, whose ravishing beauty, as seen in a dream or vision, had led him out into these miraculous adventures in the land of Fairy.

The conclusion is, that, as an allegorical poem, the method of the Fairy Queen is governed by the justness of the moral: as a narrative poem, it is conducted on the ideas and usages of Chivalry. In either view, if taken by itself, the plan is defensible. But from the union of the two designs there arises a perplexity and confusion, which is the proper, and only considerable, defect of this extraordinary poem.