A comparison between two Poets and their Poems

Romantic love is an often-embraced theme of both ancient and contemporary literary works. From the tragic, frequently sacrificial and forbidden love of the ancient Greek times to more modern themes, love has always had a place in the written history of our cultures. A contributing factor to this enduring quality of love as a literary subject is its mutability. Due to the fact that so many different facets of the emotion can be depicted in a work, we never tire of reading about it. The various perceptions of love which are portrayed in works of literature always manage to keep our attention. Two major literary works which each illustrate an individual take on love are Christopher Marlow’s “Hero and Leander,” and Edmund Spenser’s “Epithalamion.” While Marlowe’s work has a logistical tone and seems to view love in a more superficial manner, Spenser’s poem is a celebration of love which elevates the beloved to a great height. The two main characters in Marlowe’s poem are both young people of a superlative nature. Each one possesses beauty which others seem to be in awe of. In the beginning of the work, Hero is described as “Hero the fair,” who has lovers committing suicide at her feet when she rejects them.
Spencer,s poem ,epithelamion is a work which is in stark contrast to Marlowe,s poem .While Marlowe concentrates on the physical and more superficial aspects of love and never really touches on the emotions of the two lovers, Spenser presents a more idealized portrait of the emotion. His poem is a wedding poem, discussing the hours before his wedding, the wedding itself, and the hopes and feelings that he is experiencing. Similarly to Marlowe, Spenser also cites comparisons to Greek mythical figures, but he does not do this in order to parallel the sacrificial nature and frequent suffering. He references the Greeks in his work in order to compare his bride-to-be to a goddess, “lyke Phoebe . This is only one of the many comparisons which he makes, also comparing her to “some mayden Queene . He pleads with the sun to continue shining all day in honor of her, and for the weather to be nice for the wedding day. If Spenser’s poem is about sacrificial love at all, it seems to be about the sacrifices which he would be willing to make in the name of the woman he loved, not ones that he would be forced to make. fact, there is not so much attention focused on her appearance in the poem as there is on the effect that her appearance has on others. Her breath is so sweet that “many would praise the sweet smell as she passed, and she was so similar to Venus in beauty that “Cupid pined, and looking in her face, was strooken blind. Leander does not escape the power of her appearance, either. At one point in the poem he recognizes the influence which her physical traits have, stating, “I would my rude words had the influence To lead my thoughts, as thy fair looks do mine. ” It is this beauty of Hero’s which at first brings the two of them together. At the great feast, Leander and Hero both notice one another and are at once hit with Cupid’s arrow. It seems that they both fall in love spontaneously upon first sight. Although many people view this occurrence as a strictly mythic happening, Marlowe states his belief that, “What we behold is censured by our eyes….Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?”




well the debate on love is so far contrast two separate views on love ....