About S. P. Cooper
Ph. D., English Literary and Cultural Studies. Medieval literature and history; research on Arthuriana, chivalry, kingship, and the Church.

Alexander Pope
Download Link: Released 2020.09.28
The panel reads Book I of Alexander Pope’s translation of The Iliad, discusses Pope’s approach contextually, compares that approach to the modern translations of Fitzgerald and Fagles (amongst others), and considers theoretical commentary on translations.
Tags: Alexander Pope, Homer, Poetry, The Iliad

One speculative source for Camlann: Porth Cadlan, Wales
Download Link: Released 2020.09.21
The panel examines the biography of John Masefield before reading and examining excerpts from his Arthurian cycle, Midsummer Night, with special attention on the unique aspects of Masefield’s recasting of traditional Arthurian mythological elements.
Tags: Arthuriana, John Masefield, Midsummer Night, Poetry

Calliope and Clio
Download Link: Released 2020.09.14
The panel reviews the epilogue-like Mutabilitie Cantos of the Faerie Queene, reviewing scholarly opinion about their place in the whole poem, and considering the interrelations of the Greco-Roman pantheon to Nature, Time, and the Judeo-Christian God.
Tags: Edmund Spenser, Faerie Queene, Poetry

King Arthur and the Questing Beast, by Aubrey Beardsley
Download Link: Released 2020.09.07
The panel reviews the second half of Spenser’s book of courtesy, with attention given to the scholarly view of C. S. Lewis, Northrop Frye, and others, that Courtesy represents the central portion of the poem and that it is the essential Spenserian virtue.
Tags: Edmund Spenser, Faerie Queene, Poetry

King Arthur and the Questing Beast
Download Link: Released 2020.08.31
The panel examines the first half of Spenser’s book of courtesy, reading its depictions in the light of the historical development of chevalrie/chivalry and courtoise/courtesy, and comparing its depiction of characters to those found in other Arthuriana.

Mary, Queen of Scots
Download Link: Released 2020.08.17
The panel examines historical criticism of Book V, with particular attention to the mid-twentieth-century development of a moral-allegorical reading in contrast to the earlier historical reading, and considers how the two might best be combined.
Tags: Edmund Spenser, Faerie Queene, Poetry

Artegall Battles Radigund
Download Link: Released 2020.08.10
The full panel convenes to discuss Spenser’s approach to justice in Book V, with attention given to the challenges Artegall’s Solomon-like judgement faces–a dispute between knights, a giant of revolution, and ultimately the Amazon queen Radigund herself.
Tags: Edmund Spenser, Faerie Queene, Poetry

Amoret and Aemylia with Prince Arthur in the cottage of Sclaunder, by G.A. Periam.
Download Link: Released 2020.08.03
The panel concludes the book of friendship with an examination of the character of Sclaunder, and an account of Spenser’s planned poetic cartography–Epithalmion Thamesis–intended to give all the rivers of Britain ‘their right names and right passage’.
Tags: Edmund Spenser, Faerie Queene, Poetry

Knights in a Joust
Download Link: Released 2020.07.20
The panel turns its attention to the Book of Friendship, sometimes described as the ‘least interesting’ of the sections, and discusses whether it has been unfairly maligned or whether Spenser’s intentions can explain the book’s perceived deficiencies.
Tags: Edmund Spenser, Faerie Queene, Poetry

Hellenore and the Satyrs
Download Link: Released 2020.07.13
The panel addresses a reader question before turning to Book III’s unwholesome delights and the means by which the virtuous refuse them and the sinful fall prey to them, with special attention to the conduct of Hellenore, Malbecco, and the satyrs.
Tags: Edmund Spenser, Faerie Queene, Poetry