Micro-‐Theme Response and Close reading The Flames that Consume Pyrochles
The stanza presented occurs right in the middle of Guyon’s adventure in Book 2, end of Canto VI. Here the onlookers watch as an invisible fire set by Furor is horrifically burning Pyrochles. Archimago is the only one to approach Pyrochles and attempt to help.
49 -‐ And cald, Pyrochles, what is this, I see? What hellish furie hath at earst thee hent? Furious ever I thee knew to bee, Yet never in this strange astonishment. These flames, these flames (he cryde) do me torment. What flames (quoth he) when I thee present see, In danger rather to be drent, then brent? Harrow, the flames, which me consume (said hee) Ne can be quench, within my secret bowels bee.
The irony of Pyrochles being “torment[ed]” by fire responds to the virtue of temperance that Spenser attempts to teach the reader. Pyrochles is so “consume[d]” with his rage and the fire inside him, that eventually it is fire that halts and weakens him. Spenser places emphasis on the “flames” in this stanza by having the word repeated four times. The flames are powerful and have a dominating presence in the stanza. To further note the significance of the fire, line two uses consonance with the repetition of the H words. When we remove all other words from the sentence we are left with “hellish,” “hath” and “hent,” which can translate to Hell hath seized. The implications of this sentence would mean that Hell, itself, has literally seized control or “consume[d]” Pyrochles’ body.
When Archimago approaches and asks “what is this, I see?” it raises questions about what exactly Spenser means by “seeing,” because flames here are noted to be invisible. In the stanza Spenser repeats the words “see” and “bee”. These repetitions draw attention to what it is to see something and to actually be something, and whether or not it is necessary to visibly see something in order that that thing to be. Spenser ends the first line of this stanza with the word “see,” then rotates through “bee” and “see” on lines three and six, but then ends it with “bee”. Two possibilities of interpretation are that seeing and being are completely separate from each
