Cetaceous Sin and Dragon Death: The Faerie Queene, Natural Philosophy, and the Limits of Allegory

Abstract

In this essay, I investigate the curious persistence of the carcass of the final dragon in Book I of The Faerie Queene. Well after the dragon has been vanquished by Red Cross, the corpse continues to dominate the poem, drawing spectators who examine and measure the creature’s hulking but lifeless expanse. I suggest that the poem describes the corpse of Book I’s final dragon using the techniques of natural philosophy, deploying representational conventions common to contemporary visual and textual accounts of whale strandings. This interpolation of natural philosophical discourse temporarily suspends the allegorical program of the poem, drawing attention to the interpretive protocols of Renaissance allegory and to the challenge posed by the dead body to modern theories of allegorization. This article adds to a small but growing body of critical work suggesting that Spenser’s preoccupation with contemporary scientific inquiry is visible in The Faerie Queene, and suggests that the poem’s allegorical program incorporates multiple discursive practices—including natural philosophy—in order to supplement the representation of events and states resistant to a “dark conceit.”