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Spenser’s The Faerie Queene, Book I

by Edmund Spenser

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Questions and Topics

(Canto II)

1. How does the knight feel and act while under Archimago’s spell? 2. What becomes of Una? 3. How does Archimago plan to deceive her? 4. Tell the story of the lovers turned into trees. 5. Who was Sansfoy? 6. Describe the appearance and character of Duessa. 7. What did she have to do with Fradubio and Fraelissa? 8. What was the old belief about the penance of witches? 9. How only could the lovers be restored to their human shape? Was it done? 10. Who were St. George, Phoebus, Titan, Tithonius? 11. Explain the reference to Chaunticlere in l. 6.

12. Find examples of alliteration in xix; of balance in xxxvii; and of Latinizing in xix; xxxvi; xxxviii, and xl.

13. Paraphrase in your own words ll. 111, 134-135, 162 (giving two interpretations); 335, 386-387.

14. What figure of speech is used in xiii, xvi, and xx?

15. Study the rich word-painting in the description of sunrise in vii. Find other examples of this poet’s use of “costly” epithets.

16. Scan the following passages: 148, 174, 178, 193, and 299.

17. Find example of tmesis (separation of prep. from ob.) in xlv.

18. What is the difference between the two wells in xliii?

19. To whom do the pronouns in ll. 174, 175 refer?

20. What is the case of heavens in l. 193? of Sarazin in l. 217?

21. What words are omitted in ll. 188, 313, 398?

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