A Proposal
To Update the 1912 Oxford University Press Edition
Of
The Poetical Works of Edmund Spenser
By
Patrick Cheney, David Lee Miller, and Joseph F. Loewenstein
April 1999
In what follows, we propose a new edition of the collected works of Edmund Spenser to replace the Oxford University Press edition of the Poetical Works published in 1912 by J. C. Smith and Ernest de Selincourt.
Our plans are guided by four main principles:
1. All texts must be re-edited based on a more extensive collation of existing sources.
2. Prose works, most especially A View of the Present State of Ireland, must be included.
3. The internal organization of the edition will group and sequence the works according to their original dates of publication. In effect we will present not a series of individual texts but a series of published books, from A Theatre for Worldlings (1569) to A View (first published by James Ware in 1633).
4. Preparing a library edition according to the style and format of the Oxford English Text Series is the first phase of an editing project whose second phase will include a one-volume edition for classroom use and a digital archive for both scholarly and classroom use.
Following a brief introduction that summarizes our qualifications for the task, we will elaborate these principles in two sections: a general rationale for the new edition and a specific description of its form and content. At the end, we include a sample contents page.
The Editors
The authors of this proposal are a team of three senior American scholars: Patrick Cheney, Professor of English and Comparative Literature at The Pennsylvania State University; Joseph F. Loewenstein, Associate Professor of English at Washington University; and David Lee Miller, Professor of English at the University of Kentucky. As the attached vitas indicate, we are established scholars with strong reputations in Spenser criticism and scholarship. We look forward to the challenge of preparing a new scholarly edition of Spenser with confidence and a realistic understanding of the demands such a project will make on our time, energy, and scholarship.
Patrick Cheney has published two critical monographs and one co-edited collection of critical essays on Spenser. He is an editor of the scholarly journal Comparative Literature Studies and is currently (1998-2000) Vice-President of the International Spenser Society, for which he will serve as President during the subsequent biennium. Joseph Loewenstein has written widely on Spenser and is internationally recognized for his work on the topic of material text production in the early modern period; he is currently editing The Staple of News for the Cambridge Jonson. David Lee Miller is the author of one critical monograph and co-editor of one essay-collection on Spenser. He has co-edited two other volumes of critical essays and is a past President of the Spenser Society.
Rationale for a new edition
The current Oxford edition of Spenser served scholars and students well for many decades but has been seriously out of date for a long time. Smith and de Selincourt did not base their edition on an extensive collation even of the sources known to them in 1912. Since that time not only have new printed and manuscript materials come to light, but the theory of textual editing has undergone profound intellectual transformations, with substantial practical consequences; editorial practice has also, of course, been substantially assisted by changes in technology. Despite these drawbacks the text itself still has some utility: it is occasionally used for citations in critical work, and serves as the basis for A. C. Hamilton's annotated edition of The Faerie Queene (Longman, 1976). The same cannot be said for the volume's critical commentary, limited to a single "Introduction, Biographical and Critical" that is seldom read and never cited. The standard format of the OETS combines critical introductions to each work with commentary placed at the end of the edition, so by OUP's own standards the Smith and de Selincourt Spenser is clearly antiquated.
Not only is the Oxford Spenser out of date, it is also incomplete. This is true not only because, as a "poetical works" rather than a collected works, it omits most of Spenser's prose, but also because even from the "poetical works" it omits some verses of questionable authorship (for example, two epigrams published by James Ware in 1633 and attributed to Spenser). The only complete scholarly edition of Spenser produced in this century is the 11-volume Variorum Edition of Edmund Spenser (Johns Hopkins, 1932-57). This edition too, although authoritative in its day, is deficient by current standards: the text relies on a collation of only a small number of the extant early exemplars and, as W. P. Williams has observed, "many of the copies were only 'spot collated'"; moreover, much of the commentary amassed by the Variorum editors is of limited interest now.
Since the publication of the Variorum, the growth of a market for classroom texts has led to many editions of individual and selected works. The number and variety of these editions testify to a lively ongoing interest in Spenser. Although these provide clear evidence that Spenser's work still commands both critical and pedagogical attention, none of them pretends to function as a comprehensive scholarly text. To put it simply, a new scholarly edition of Spenser's collected works would face no serious competition. The field is open and undefended.
Spenser is a major English author. His work is not just canonical, it played a founding role in the historical project of forming a canon of English literature. For this reason, Spenser's poetry and prose lie at the center of an intellectually vital tradition of critical attention, supported by the kind of scholarly and pedagogical infrastructure typical of major authors: multiple paperback editions for classroom use, a scholarly organization (The International Spenser Society allied with the Modern Language Association of America), a second scholarly group (Spenser at Kalamazoo) affiliated with the International Congress of Medieval Studies, and two periodicals (Spenser Studies: A Renaissance Poetry Annual, and The Spenser Newsletter). Sessions devoted to Spenser are a regular feature not only at the annual MLA convention and at Kalamazoo, but at several other national and regional scholarly conferences in the United States (at, for example the
Sixteenth Century Studies Conference, the annual meetings of the Renaissance Society of America, and the meetings of the various regional affiliates of the MLA). And as the quadrennial anniversaries of various milestones in Spenser's career have been reached during the 1990s, each has been celebrated by at least one national or international scholarly event. The 1996 conference held at Yale University received more than 200 proposals from around the world (including the UK, Canada, Israel, and Japan), and its success has led the Spenser Society to plan another international conference to be held in England in the year 2001. This coming August, a private business group from Doneraile, Ireland, is holding an international conference to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Spenser's death in 1599.
Form and content of the new edition
The editors propose changes of several kinds to the original Oxford Spenser. As indicated in the attached table of contents, the new edition will go beyond the old one by printing all of Spenser's works, not just his poetical works and the Spenser-Harvey letters. In addition to all the known poetry and these letters, the edition would print other prose works (including the View and another document on Ireland, A Brief Note), some correspondence, and the Axiochus, a translation of a Platonic dialogue. The attribution of several of these texts to Spenser has been contested and although we shall make every effort to resolve or, at least, advance arguments concerning Spenser's authorship, we wish to include all texts attributed to Spenser during or shortly after his lifetime. Moreover, we wish to include even disputed works within the unfolding chronological presentation of the canon, rather than setting them aside in some separate section or appendix. For the purposes of this edition, the fact of an attribution is far more important than the validity of that attribution.
That several works are attributed to Spenser
on uncertain grounds seems to us more revealing than problematic. Many of
his early works were printed anonymously--the notorious example is The Shepheardes
Calender--and many of his works--the printed correspondence with Harvey
or Astrophel--were included as part
of collaborative volumes. In other words, single and identifiable authorship
is often not an organizing feature of the books in which Spenser's first appeared.
In some ways, then, the author-centered critical edition is imperfectly
suited to representing Spenser's literary career. While we will seek to maintain
secure accord with the norms of the Oxford English Texts Series, we also wish to make clear (if the
paradox is tolerable) both the particular personal obscurities and the strong
sense of a burgeoning literary community that hedge the Spenser canon. Our
decision on how to present texts like The Shepheardes
Calender or the Spenser-Harvey Correspondence--with the contributions
of collaborators like "E.K." or Harvey presented on a level of those of Spenser
himself--reflects our conviction that to demote collateral contributions
is to misrepresent Spenser's work itself.
Production costs of an inclusive edition will exceed those of a mere update
of Smith and de Selincourt. Some of the texts that we propose to include
are of considerable interest at this time. Scholars who seek to situate Spenser's
literary and professional career within the history of English colonial ideology
and practice require reliable editions of the prose tracts on Ireland to supplement
their reading of (for example) Book V of The Faerie
Queene. A text like the Axiochus, on the other hand,
is necessary for scholars who wish to sustain the long-standing study of
Spenser's humanism and of his engagement with the Platonic tradition in particular.
New inclusions will be the most obvious distinguishing features of the proposed edition. But the quality of the texts needs substantial improvement. Among those who have reflected on the Oxford and Variorum editions, it is well known that the collations for both editions are quite partial. We cannot now undertake a full collation of the 110 extant copies of the 1596 quarto of The Faerie Queene, but we can substantially expand on the two that Smith collated, and so fill out the list of variants. It is fair to say that only the Prothalamion and the Complaints have undergone really thorough bibliographical analysis; such analysis needs to be performed on the entire canon.
Our approach to The Faerie Queene requires special comment. The Oxford Spenser represented an important bibliographical advance: Smith and de Selincourt established that Spenser had corrected the1590 Faerie Queene, and that the 1596 edition represents those corrections with appreciable fidelity. With the support of the Variorum editors, this has become orthodox scholarly opinion. Despite this, we wish to assert that the 1590 version was also a finished text, a polished first state, and we will work to represent the integrity of that edition, its importance in the serial unfolding of Spenser's literary career. We therefore intend to print Books I through III as a distinct unit, and to follow that unit, not with Books IV through VI, but with the collections of shorter poems next published. Whether this organization of the edition-- this representation of Spenser's literary career--requires us to adopt the 1590 quarto as a copy text is something that is still, for us, a subject for debate.
This raises the general question of the organization of the edition. As indiated, we propose to present the complete works of Spenser in the order in which they were first printed. The edition would thus be the first attempt to assemble Spenser s works as a chronological series of printed historical documents, beginning with the 1569 edition of A Theatre for Worldlings (not the usual 1579 Shepheardes Calender), and ending with the 1633 edition of the View. This principle of ordering would change the old one, which distinguished between the poet's major work, The Faerie Queene, and his minor works (such as The Shepheardes Calender or Epithalamion), and thus printed The Faerie Queene first and tucked the minor works in at the back. Such an evaluative hierarchy is not longer useful or acceptable, as scholars and critics have become much more interested in the shape of Spenser's literary career and in the publication history of his work.
Typography and Layout. The new edition would also change its fundamental look. Page design would be adjusted to conform to that of other editions in the Oxford English Text series. The exact nature of the reformatting would require conversation with the Press. (For the anticipated school edition, we would surely need to switch to a larger page and double-column format.)
Introduction. The new edition would offer a new orientation to Spenser, his works, and his age, as well as afford a view of his place in English and Western letters. Since 1912, a tremendous amount of work on such topics as Spenserian allegory, nationalism, sexual ideology, and theology has been done, and much of it dictates the need for a considerably revised introduction to Spenser. Moreover, scholars are pressing forward to produce a new standard biography of Spenser, replacing Judson's life from the late 1940s. The purpose of the new introduction would be to present a brief life of Spenser; to situate his works in the context of current scholarship and criticism; to introduce readers to the most important and most difficult features of his works, including his relation to biblical and classical culture, to medieval traditions of romance, to the Continental Renaissance, to the Protestant imaginative tradition, and to such topics as allegory, English nationalism, early modern sexuality, and Reformation theology.
Introductions to Individual Works. The new edition would include short introductions to each work, in accordance with recent practice in the Oxford English Text series (such as the new Mary Sidney Herbert edition). Each introduction would provide the background information necessary for approaching the work, inventory the main lines of criticism, and provide an orienting guide. We would also provide short introductions for each book of The Faerie Queene, as has become the standard practice in such editions as The Yale Shorter Poetry or the Longman Faerie Queene.
Commentary. The new edition would include a new commentary at the back of each volume of the edition, in conformity with the current norms of the Oxford English Text series. The Commentary would include introductions to the important shorter poems--to each of the eclogues in The Shepheardes Calender, for example, and to each of the major components of the Complaints volume--but would mainly comprise concise notes on individual words, phrases, or passages that require special annotation.
Plan and schedule for the new edition
Thus we would produce the first annotated edition ever assembled of Spenser's collected works. To do so, we plan to divide the organizational, critical, and textual work among us. Cheney would be primarily responsible for overseeing the general management of the project, from its first to its final phases, including planning, manuscript assembly, and production. Miller would be primarily responsible for overseeing and producing all critical introductions and commentary. And Loewenstein would be primarily responsible for overseeing and producing the actual text of Spenser's works.
Even though each of us would preside over a specific part of the project, we would all be involved in each of the three principal tasks, especially the second and third: the writing of the critical apparatus and the production of the text. In this way, we would each have a primary task of responsibility yet be integrally involved in the tasks of writing and editing.
We anticipate that the project would take six years to complete. To advance the project, we plan to apply for a series of grants, both internal (within our individual universities) and external (especially from such important venues as the National Endowment for the Humanities [NEH]). In fact, Penn State's Institute for the Arts and Humanistic Studies (IAHS), directed by Robert R. Edwards, has already agreed to sponsor the start-up phase of the project. The IAHS is now working with Penn State, the University of Kentucky, and Washington University to coordinate a complex interface relating three universities to Oxford University Press, the NEH, and a computer firm such as Adobe or IBM (which would be responsible for helping us with the digital part of the project). Specifically, the IAHS has made contact with the NEH, whose Director of Research, James Herbert, recently visited Penn State, during which time he advised the university above all to promote projects producing "scholarly editions." The IAHS is also communicating with other Penn State units to secure additional funding. Once this funding is in place, the IAHS will work with Kentucky and Washington to establish a tri-university funding base for the required seed monies leading to nationally competitive grants, such as through the NEH.
After submitting the present proposal to OUP this spring, we plan to hold an editorial summit at Penn State in July. The purpose of this summit would be to take the project to the next stage, working with such sponsoring officials at Penn State as the IAHS Director, as well as with, hopefully, an editor from OUP, whose trip the project would fund. Later in July, Cheney would travel to England to begin work on the actual editing of the text, principally The Shepheardes Calender, as a test-case for actual editorial procedures. This experience will prove vital to the external grant-writing phase to follow.
Below is a tentative six-year plan and schedule.
Year 1: The Planning Phase. We would work with OUP to determine the precise form of the volume and the shape of the project. The current proposal is a first step in that direction. While we have had to make a number of decisions about both the form of the edition and the shape of the project in order to complete the proposal, we would emphasize our willingness to work with OUP to iron out the final details. This first year would also be a grant-writing year and an exploratory year, in which, for instance, we would determine whether we need to bring on any other team members. In particular, we hope to bring on a fourth editor who can help us with the View, but we envision assigning special tasks to other individuals as well, such as would be needed for the Platonic dialogue, Axiochus, and finally we are thinking of forming a working group of "consulting editors."
Years 2-4: The Archival Phase. We would work with the original editions and manuscripts of Spenser's works. This phase would put the grants into operation; it would form the principal research phase. We would visit libraries in the United States (such as the Folger Library and the Huntington Library) and in the UK (principally the British Library, the Bodleian, and the University Library). As a collective group, we have worked in all of these libraries, and thus we can pursue the requisite work in a timely way.
Years 5-6: The Writing and Text-Assembly Phase. We would actually produce the edition, submitting it to Oxford University Press both in hard copy and on disk. We would regularize and integrate all criticism into a standard style, form, and format. Similarly, we would regularize and integrate all textual material.
*
According to this six-year plan and schedule, we would submit the new Oxford University Press edition of The Collected Works of Edmund Spenser in the year 2006. Manuscript review could then take place in 2007 and final publication in 2008--very close to the one-century mark after the original edition first appeared.
Significance of the new edition
Oxford University Press' new edition of The Collected Works of Edmund Spenser would be significant because it would be the standard edition for the century to come. The edition would be the only completely annotated edition of Spenser's works available. It would provide a new and authoritative text of all known and disputed works, and it would provide new critical introductions and commentary on Spenser, his works, and his age. Because of its innovations and experiments in textual editing, it would also serve as a pioneer for other editions on other writers and works. Finally, because of Spenser's standing as a major author in the English and Continental tradition, the edition would be a significant contribution to Western letters.
We look forward to entering into contract with Oxford University Press in order to begin this important scholarly project.
The Complete Works of Edmund Spenser
Edited by Patrick Cheney, David Lee Miller, and Joseph F. Loewenstein
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
References and Abbreviations
Editorial Procedure
Chronology
Introduction
Life and Careers, Secretarial and Literary
Origins, Early Reception, and Influence
State of Scholarship and Criticism
Orientation to Critical Topics
Future Criticism
Works
A Theatre for Worldlings (1569 Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
The Shepheardes Calender (1579 Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
Spenser-Harvey Correspondence (1580 Editions)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
Three Proper, and Wittie, Familiar Letters
Two Other Very Commendable Letters
The Faerie Queene (1590 Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
Dedication to Queen Elizabeth
Book I. The Legende of the Knight of the Red Croswse, or of Holinesse
Book II. The Legend of Sir Guyoin, or of Temperaunce
Book III. The Legend of Britomartis, or of Chastitie
A Letter of the Authors to Sir Walter Raleigh
Commendatory Verses [need to be listed individually]
Dedicatory Sonnets [need to be listed individually]
Complaints. Containing Sundrie Small Poems of the Worlds Vanitie. (1591 Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
The Ruines of Time
The Teares of the Muses
V\irgils Gnat
Prosopopoia: Or Mother Hubberds Tale
Ruines of Rome: By Bellay
Muipotmos: Or the Fate of the Butterflie
Visions of the Worlds Vanitie
The Visions of Bellay
The Visions of Petrarch
Daphnaida. An Elegie upon the Death of the Noble and Vertuous Douglas Howard (1591 Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
Colin Clouts Come Home Againe and Astrophel (1595)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
Colin Clouts Come Home Againe
Astrophel. A Pastorall Elegie upon the Death of the Most Noble and Valorous Knight, Sir Philip Sidney.
The Lay of Clorinda
The Mourning Muse of Thestylis
A Pastorall Aeglogue upon the Death of Sir Philip Sidney, Knight, etc.
An Elegie, or Friends Passion, for His Astrophill
An Epitaph upon the Right Honourable Sir Philip Sidney, Knight, Lord Governor of Flushing
Another of the Same
Amoretti and Epithalamion (1595 Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
Amoretti
Anacreontics
Epithalmiion
The Faerie Queene (1596 Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
Dedication to Queen Elizabeth
Stanzas added to the 1596 Edition, concluding Book III
Book IV. The Legende of Cambel and Telamond, or of Friendship
Book V. The Legende of Artegall, or of Justice
Book VI. The Legend of Calidore, or of Courtesie
Fowre Hymnes (1596 Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
An Hymne in Honour of Love
An Hymne in Honour of Beautie
An Hymne of Heavenly Love
An Hymne of Heavenly Beautie
Prothalamion (1596 Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
Two Cantoes of Mutabilitie (1609 Folio Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
A View of the Present State of Ireland (1633 Edition)
Literary and Critical Context
Text
Miscellaneous Poems
Literary and Critical Context
Text
Miscellaneous Prose
Secretarial Letters
A Brief Note
Axiochus
Commentary
Note on the Texts
Glossary
Table of Verse Forms
Index of First Lines and Titles of Works
General Index to Introductions and Textual Essays