ABSTRACT
In itself, the event was not sufficiently important either politically or socially to warrant Spenser’s exquisite praise. The immediate cause may be found in the presence, at the occasion and in the poem, of Essex, whose patronage Spenser was seeking. Essex may have been called upon to be the host because of family connections: he was related to Worcester’s wife, and his wife to Henry Guildford. Spenser uses his presence to lift the poem out of the private and into the public sphere.
