Constancy, Tristram, and the “Parcell” of The Faerie Queene Book VII

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2025

Publisher

University of Chicago Press

Source Publication

Spenser Studies

Source ISSN

0195-9468

Original Item ID

DOI: 10.1086/733373

Abstract

Spenser’s Mutabilitie Cantos appeared to their first printer as “parcell of some following Booke of the Faerie Queene, Vnder the Legend of Constancie.” This essay imagines a Legend of Constancy, a Book VII that would continue The Faerie Queene’s consistent pattern of differentiating human from faerie virtues, with the former involving virtue more in discursive reasoning. The Cantos have signs of a philosophical digression pertinent to Constancy, a discursive virtue conducive to partitioning (as fidelity, perseverance, and perspective); they also have ligatures to Tristram in Book VI, canto ii, who, as an adaptation of Malory, is superbly qualified as a human Knight of Constancy.

Comments

Published version. Spenser Studies, Vol. 39 (2025). DOI. © 2025 University of Chicago Press. Used with permission.

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