Friends of
Rutgers English Fall/Winter 2004
A Newsletter for Alumni and Friends of the Department of English

Inside This Issue
Mellon Grant Supports Research in English
From the Chair
Roz Retires
Alicia Ostriker Retires
Ann Baynes Coiro Wins Fellowship
Kingston's Birthday Reading
A New Reader for Readers
Prize-Winning Parody
Faculty Bookshelf

Alumni Authors Wanted

New Faculty Profile: Sonali Perera
New Faculty: Josie Saldaña
A Job Well Done
Adrienne Rich Visits
Teacher, Playwright: Ken Urban
A History of Rutgers English
A Scholarly Treat
More About Friends of Rutgers English

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PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION
Prize-Winning Parody

By Rachel E. Tomcsik

The English Department congratulates Rutgers College student Gina Wise, who was awarded Honorable Mention in the Spenserian Stanza Competition for her poem, “The Fairie Queene: Vnleash’d.”

The annual Spenserian Stanza Competition is a contest jointly sponsored by the Edmund Spenser Home Page, the Spenser Review, and the International Spenser Society. Ms. Wise was one of only eight poets recognized in this year’s competition for her excellence in writing Spenserian stanzas. Renaissance poet Edmund Spenser wrote his greatest work, The Fairie Queene, entirely in the stanza form that he created, a poetic form that is notoriously complex, difficult to write and to read.

Ms. Wise, an English major and an Anthropology minor, has been interested in Renaissance literature since high school. She wrote the poem while taking a seminar on Spenser with Professor Jacqueline T. Miller and a creative writing course with Sina Queyras.

Her poem describes, ironically, the frustration that many of Spenser’s readers experience when trying to understand the language and dense allegory of The Fairie Queene. “I’m glad the judge had a sense of humor and didn’t discard my poem because of the topic I chose,” Ms. Wise said.

To read the full text of Ms. Wise’s poem and to learn more about the competition, please visit The Edmund Spenser Home Page.

The Spenserian Stanza: A Brief Introduction

Named after English Renaissance poet Edmund Spenser, the Spenserian stanza consists of nine lines, rhyming ababbcbcC. The first eight lines are in iambic pentameter, containing ten syllables and five alternating stresses. This rhythm is familiar to many of us from Shakespeare’s plays and sonnets. The final line of each stanza is an Alexandrine, which is a line of verse in iambic hexameter (twelve syllables, 6 beats) instead of pentameter. The extra two syllables extend the last line, making it break the rhythm and punctuate the stanza with an additional rhyme.

The form was later imitated in the eighteenth century but was modified to make it easier to read and write. The original form would make a comeback in the Romantic period. Here is the first stanza from Spenser’s The Fairie Queene:

Lo I the man, whose Muse whilome did maske,
As time her taught, in lowly Shepheards weeds,
Am now enforst a far vnfitter taske,
For trumpets sterne to chaunge mine Oaten reeds,
And sing of Knights and Ladies gentle deeds;
Whose prayses hauing slept in silence long,
Me, all too meane, the sacred Muse areeds
To blazon broad emongst her learned throng:
Fierce warres and faithfull loues shall moralize my song.

For more examples of poems in the Spenserian stanza format, please visit here.

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Published by Friends of Rutgers English
Editorial Staff:
Julia Chen, Jennifer Chu, Kasey Cullen, Andréa Mules,
Kelly O'Toole, Rachel E. Tomcsik
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