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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The definitive edition of Spenser, for now..., 4 Dec 2004
First published between 1932 and 1945, it would be easy to write off this comprehensive edition of Spenser as out-of-date. In the more popular areas of the Spenser canon, newer and better volumes have taken its place, such as A.C. Hamilton's excellent edition of 'The Faerie Queene'. As the 11 volumes of the Variorum suggest however, Spenser is much more than simply 'The Faerie Queene', and in many areas the Variorum more than holds its own. Each of these volumes is divided up into three main sections: Spenser's text itself, a commentary, and an appendix which varies from volume to volume but generally contains related contemporary material, general criticism, and sources. The commentary and appendices are invariably as long as the text, and often much longer, giving a weight of detail that puts Spenser's works into full persepective. Variant readings are always given, a fact that comes in especially useful in the Prose Works volume, where 'A View of the Present State of Ireland' has variant readings of quite substantial passages. Although these volumes have bibliographies, they are obviously 60 years out of date, which makes them of limited use for research. For someone simply looking for a good edition of 'The Faerie Queene', the alternative options range from the extremely cheap version published in the Wordsworth Classics of World Literature series (which has an introduction but only occasional notes) to the hard-to-find 'The Poetical Works' from OUP (which has all Spenser's other poems as well as 'The Faerie Queene', but no notes), to the Hamilton version (which is about as detailed as most readers will ever need, but correspondingly expensive). The six volumes of the Variorum 'Faerie Queene' are probably not the best way into Spenser for someone new to him, but are ideal for someone familiar with his writing who want to explore individual books in more detail. For someone trying to gain an insight into the whole corpus of Spenser's work (and his life, in the somewhat dated biography by Judson, which as yet has no clear successor), the Variorum is likely to remain the main reference work until the new Oxford edition of the complete works of Spenser comes out in several years time. Until then, it is certainly the best place to find the 'minor' poems treated fairly (vols. 7 and 8); one of the best for the prose works (vol. 10- A View of the Present State of Ireland, A Brief Note of Ireland, Axiochus, and Spenser's Letters); and a good source of reference for 'The Faerie Queene'. They are neither light nor (collectively) cheap, but for now they are the best complete works of Spenser available.
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