The Faerie Queene

This quote by the narrator of the poem comes at the beginning of Book I, Canto IV and poses some advice directly to a potential reader. Many cantos begin with commentary from the narrator, sometimes framed as advice to a reader, other times just presented as general musings. Often, these commentaries deal with the virtue or vice that is most important to the action of the canto. Here, for example, the narrator warns of “fraud” and “ficklenesse.”

While the narrator’s advice is general, it could also be interpreted specifically as a warning to the Redcross Knight to beware the tricky sorceress Duessa and trust instead the faithful Una. The poem often works on both a general and specific level at the same time, with the individual actions of the characters meant to represent broader moral issues that could apply to almost anyone. This specific commentary by the narrator deals with the concept of authenticity, particularly for women, and this is a subject that will come up again and again in the poem. The poem is full of women like Duessa who appear sweet on the surface but only want to lead men to their dooms. Women in the poem can save men and represent the highest form of virtue, but this seeming admiration for women is mixed with the constant anxiety that women who appear virtuous might not be what they seem. 

This quote is spoken by Una to the Redcross Knight when he is confronting Despair, one of the most significant episodes in the first book of the poem. Fittingly enough, the Redcross Knight’s encounter with the monster Despair is an allegory for him confronting his own despair and facing up to all the ways he has potentially sinned by abandoning his lady, Una. Despair is a monster who kills knights by providing them the means to commit suicide, and the Redcross Knight seems to be on the verge of killing himself when Una intervenes at the last minute.

The scene of the Redcross Knight confronting Despair is powerful because some of Despair’s arguments do make sense and sound logical on the surface. While Despair tells a slanted version of events, he nevertheless causes the Redcross Knight to feel regret by reminding him of real actions he took in the past. Up until this point in the poem, Una has been a largely passive character who is essentially helpless without someone like the Redcross Knight to protect her. Here, however, she illustrates that her relationship with the Redcross Knight is not always a one-way partnership with him as protector—her own virtue helps fortify him, and at crucial moments, it can even help save him.

This quote by the narrator ends the last canto of the first book of The Faerie Queene and helps establish how the different books of the poem will have an episodic structure. The nautical metaphor, particularly the part about how it’s time to “land some of our passengers,” suggests that the poem itself is a long journey, and that “passengers” (i.e., the characters in the story) will be coming and going at different parts of the narrative. Although this passage implies that the story of the Redcross Knight and Una has reached its end, in fact the Redcross Knight will show up quite a few more times in the story, even after getting his seeming happily-ever-after ending. It is true, however, that the Redcross Knight will never be the protagonist again (he mostly plays a support role to new protagonists), and so in that sense, this canto is a sort of goodbye to him.

This quote by the narrator of the poem comes at the beginning of Book I, Canto IV and poses some advice directly to a potential reader. Many cantos begin with commentary from the narrator, sometimes framed as advice to a reader, other times just presented as general musings. Often, these commentaries deal with the virtue or vice that is most important to the action of the canto. Here, for example, the narrator warns of “fraud” and “ficklenesse.”

While the narrator’s advice is general, it could also be interpreted specifically as a warning to the Redcross Knight to beware the tricky sorceress Duessa and trust instead the faithful Una. The poem often works on both a general and specific level at the same time, with the individual actions of the characters meant to represent broader moral issues that could apply to almost anyone. This specific commentary by the narrator deals with the concept of authenticity, particularly for women, and this is a subject that will come up again and again in the poem. The poem is full of women like Duessa who appear sweet on the surface but only want to lead men to their dooms. Women in the poem can save men and represent the highest form of virtue, but this seeming admiration for women is mixed with the constant anxiety that women who appear virtuous might not be what they seem. 

This quote is spoken by Una to the Redcross Knight when he is confronting Despair, one of the most significant episodes in the first book of the poem. Fittingly enough, the Redcross Knight’s encounter with the monster Despair is an allegory for him confronting his own despair and facing up to all the ways he has potentially sinned by abandoning his lady, Una. Despair is a monster who kills knights by providing them the means to commit suicide, and the Redcross Knight seems to be on the verge of killing himself when Una intervenes at the last minute.

The scene of the Redcross Knight confronting Despair is powerful because some of Despair’s arguments do make sense and sound logical on the surface. While Despair tells a slanted version of events, he nevertheless causes the Redcross Knight to feel regret by reminding him of real actions he took in the past. Up until this point in the poem, Una has been a largely passive character who is essentially helpless without someone like the Redcross Knight to protect her. Here, however, she illustrates that her relationship with the Redcross Knight is not always a one-way partnership with him as protector—her own virtue helps fortify him, and at crucial moments, it can even help save him.

This quote by the narrator ends the last canto of the first book of The Faerie Queene and helps establish how the different books of the poem will have an episodic structure. The nautical metaphor, particularly the part about how it’s time to “land some of our passengers,” suggests that the poem itself is a long journey, and that “passengers” (i.e., the characters in the story) will be coming and going at different parts of the narrative. Although this passage implies that the story of the Redcross Knight and Una has reached its end, in fact the Redcross Knight will show up quite a few more times in the story, even after getting his seeming happily-ever-after ending. It is true, however, that the Redcross Knight will never be the protagonist again (he mostly plays a support role to new protagonists), and so in that sense, this canto is a sort of goodbye to him.