“이런 변덕스런 인생”: 에드먼드 스펜서의 <뮤터빌리티 칸토> 읽기

Abstract

Edmund Spenser’s The Mutabilitie Cantos, published posthumously in 1609, deals with the conflict between Mutabilitie and Jove for the sovereignty over the universe, including the world and the heaven. However, the final resolution provided by Nature is that both parties mutable beings and immutable classical gods should follow Nature’s principles and that the change and permanence are, in fact, simply two different forms of one discipline, the discipline of Nature or of God,the absolute. Although the publisher tells that the work is a part of unfinished Book 7 of The Faerie Queene, it is not clear if the work was indeed intended as a part of larger “legend,” for the work seems consistent, unified, and complete in itself, without hinting the need for an errant knight trying to achieve his/her task given by the Faerie Queen. The main character, Mutabilitie is a personified Titan, claiming that everything is under her legitimate power. More questions, however,arise as we read this somewhat simple tale. What does she represent allegorically? Why does she challenge Jove? How is the Faunus episode related to the main plot of Mutabilitie's revolt against gods? Why do all the supernatural beings, including Jove, look up Nature as their supreme judge? Is there a hierarchy among the superhuman characters?What is Nature? How does what she reveals at the end of the work contribute to the meanings of the work? This paper is to look for possible answers to these questions and then to search for consistent meanings manifested in the work, so as to understand what the poet tries to tell his readers, as well as us, with his last part of The Faerie Queene.