The Faerie Queene - Archetypal Criticism

Archetypal Criticism

While some literary works sacrifice historical context to archetypal myth, reducing poetry to Biblical quests, Spenser reinforces the actuality of his story by adhering to archetypal patterns (Gottfried 1363). Throughout the Faerie Queene, Spenser does not concentrate on a pattern “which transcends time” but “uses such a pattern to focus the meaning of the past on the present” (Gottfried 1363). By reflecting on the past, Spenser achieves ways of stressing the importance of Elizabeth’s reign. In turn, he does not “convert event into myth” but “myth into event” (Gottfried 1363). Within the Faerie Queene, Spenser blurs the distinction between archetypal and historical elements deliberately. For example, Spenser probably does not believe in the complete truth of the British Chronicle, which Arthur reads in the House of Alma (Gottfried 1363). In this instance, the Chronicle serves as a poetical equivalent for factual history. Even so, poetical history of this kind is not myth, rather, it “consists of unique, if partially imaginary, events recorded in chronological order” (Gottfried 1363). The same distinction resurfaces in the political allegory of Books One and Five. However, the reality to interpreted events becomes more apparent when the events occurred nearer to the time the poem was written (Gottfried 1363).