Spenser’s Sprites: Platonic Daemons in The Faerie Queene

Abstract

Throughout the twentieth century, critics of the poet Edmund Spenser wrestled with the question of the presence of Plato as well as Platonic thought in Spenser’s works. Having recently established the profound presence of Platonism in Spenser via Marsilio Ficino and other sources, the field of Spenser studies is now open to a treatment of exactly what kind of Platonism is present in Spenser. Drawing from the work done by researchers in the field of magic and Platonism, in this article I hope to demonstrate the presence of Platonic daemons in Spenser’s Faerie Queene who are found under the name of “sprites” or “sprights” in the poem. An examination of daemons in The Faerie Queene will elucidate some questions on the role of Merlin in the poem as well as Spenser’s own self fashioning as a poet-magus.