An update… i continue to be terribly sad that this book isn’t read more.

Wow. I can’t believe I read this book. I also can’t believe that Spenser managed to write 1055 pages (in the Penguin classic) keeping up the same rhyme scheme. I have been reading Keats poetry along side this and was so surprised to see how Keats was influenced by Spenser. My two initially unrelated parallel reads ended up being in harmony

I read while also listening to David Timson reading on Audible. The Audible was very excellent but I don’t think I could have just listened without following along. To see the words on the page made all the difference. David Timson read with a real energy that got me through some of the more difficult sections and injected theatre into the whole book.

There were definitely parts where I nearly gave up… but there were many more where I really enjoyed the ride.. the imaginary world, the beautiful language and liveliness of the story telling.
It is without doubt also very, very funny at times, raunchy and exceeding blood thirsty in a Tarantino sort of way. I have giggled my way through this..

Book three about Chastity (or The legend of Britomartis) was my favourite … very funny and entertaining but I quite liked a section when a bold knight loses a fight with an Amazon queen and is made to wear women’s clothes and spin wool on meagre food rations for evermore…until he is sprung out of bondage.

I started with a canto a night but as I got familiar with the language I managed more… not to speed through it, but from sheer enjoyment.

I didn’t get all the allegory but I found that got easier to appreciate as I read through the book. And now I absolutely have to reread Don Quixote because I think it will be even funnier having read the Faerie Queene.