Edmund Spenser’s Sonnets Notes

Who are they addressed to? Spenser is unique in that his sonnets are addressed to his wife, Elizabeth Boyle, not to some distant, unattainable love In his sonnets, Spenser’s love inspires the speaker’s poetry (sonnet 1) & becomes the sole subject of her gaze (sonnet 35); however, the poet’s triumph will be to immortalize her in verse (sonnet 75)

Sonnet 1 Spenser addresses three things: leaves (pages of a book), lines, and rhymes He hopes their combined effect on the lady will please the lady who beholds them

Sonnet 35 The speaker’s eyes desire to gaze on his love The state that the desire produces in him is a constant desire to behold his beloved which produces a state of pain and grief in the speaker

Sonnet 75 The lady says the speaker’s efforts are futile because she will eventually die and be forgotten; however, the speaker believes that his lines of poetry will forever capture or immortalize his love The poem claims that verse has the power to make immortal the relationship between the speaker and his beloved

Sonnet 30 Speaker compares his love for a woman to fire and her rejection of his love to ice. Speaker is puzzled because if his beloved is like ice & he’s like fire, how is it that his desire doesn’t melt her coldness but makes it harder? Also, how is it that his desire isn’t cooled by her coldness but instead grows hotter? Sonnet develops the paradox concluding that in the case of love, the rules of nature are suspended: fire doesn’t melt ice, nor does ice cool fire