Questions and Topics
(Canto IV)
1. What are the moral reflections in stanza i? 2. What suggestion of the condition of the English roads do you find in st. ii? 3. But few returned, l. 21. What became of the rest? 4. Give a description of the House of Pride. Note resemblance to a typical Elizabethan hall. 5. Explain the allegory of the House, noting the association of ugliness and beauty. 6. How is expectation aroused in vi? 7. Describe the dramatic appearance and character of Pride. Cf. description of Satan on his throne in Paradise Lost, iii. 8. What do you learn in this canto of Elizabethan or chivalric manners and customs? 9. Describe the procession at the court of Pride. 10. What satire of the Romish priesthood in xviii-xx? 11. Note examples of Spenser’s humor in xiv and xvi. 12. Point out the classical influence (Dionysus and Silenus) in the description of Gluttony. 13. Subject of the interview between Duessa and Sansjoy. 14. Point out the archaisms in l. 10; alliteration in xxxix and l; the Latinisms in xlvi and xlvii. 15. In what case is way in l. 17? 16. Explain the meaning and historical significance of lazar, l. 24, and diall, l. 36. 17. Explain the references of the pronouns in l. 55, and ll. 418-419. 18. Note the Euphuistic balance and antithesis in xxix and xlv. 19. Explain the suffix in marchen in l. 325. 20. Note the double negative in iv, xlix. 21. Paraphrase in your own words ll. 239, 243, 360, 437.