Spenser's Forms of History Elizabethan Poetry and the 'State of Present Time'

In Spenser's Forms of History, Bart van Es describes six modes through which Early Modern England addressed the past: chronicle, chorography, antiquarian discourse, euhemerism, typology, and prophecy. By setting this material alongside the works of Edmund Spenser, the book explores allusivestrategies ranging in effect from euology to polemic. Key Spenserian texts, including The Faerie Queene, The Shepeardes Calendar, and A View of the Present State of Ireland, are read against Elizabethan cultural documents extending from popular print to restricted manuscripts. Over the course of sixchapters, each focusing on a single 'form', the book shows Spenser to have been an exceptional historical thinker. Drawing on recent studies of nationhood, the study not only offers a new picture of the English 'Poet Historical', but also makes an innovative contribution to current debatesconcerning the relationship between literature and history.