Edmund Spenser
... through the influence of Leicester. Shortly after arriving in Dublin, Spenser marched with the Lord Deputy when he besieged fort D’Oro. Spenser consequently received a large land grant and even got a castle at Kilcolman. Maley writes that within two years Spenser moved to Munster and began work on his famous epic The Faerie Queene. It was also during this time that Spenser befriended Sir Walter Raleigh. Raleigh read Spenser’s draft and invited him to come to London with him. So, in 1590, Spenser went to London, was presented to the Queen, and spent his time writing the first three books of The Faerie Queen. In just one short year, Spenser returned to Kilcolman and fell in love with a woman named Elizabeth Boyle and married her in 1594. According to Maley’s chronology, this is the time period that Spenser wrote his piece called Amoretti. Included in this piece were many sonnets that professed his undying love for Elizabeth. One of these sonnets was Sonnet 75. In 1598 Edmund was named the Sheriff for County Cork, but did not hold this office for long because the Queen’s army was defeated at the Yellow Ford and the city of Munster was in revolt forcing Spenser and his family to move back to London. It was here, according to Van Moll, that Spenser took up residence in King’s Street and died there “for lack of bread”. No one knows how Spenser could have died from this because of the many connections he held as a poet and a political figure, but nonetheless he died in January of 1599. Interestingly, his funeral was paid for by the Earl of Essex and poets carried his coffin. Also, he was buried in Westminster Abbey right next to the tomb of Geoffrey Chaucer. Sonnet 75 Sonnet 75 was a part of Spenser’s Amoretti. According to “Spenser’s Amoretti” by Donna Gibbs, sonnets traditionally told the story of a man in love with an unattainable woman. Spenser’s sonnets were different because he wrote optimistic sonnets that even claim that his l...