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Bower of Bliss, destructive pleasure, Edmund Spenser, English Renaissance, Freud, Libya, Rory O'Keefe, Sirte
The notion of destructive pleasure that is linked to the destruction of pleasure can be initially explored through Guyon’s systematic destruction of the Bower of Bliss in Book II ‘Canto xii’ of The Faerie Queene:
But all those pleasaunt bowres and Pallace braue,
Guyon broke downe, with rigour pittilesse;
Ne ought their goodly workmanship might saue
Them from the tempest of his wrathfulnesse,
But that their blisse he turn’d to balefulnesse:
Their grouse he feld, their gardins did deface,
Their arbers spoyle, their Cabinets suppresse,
Their banket houses burne, their buildings race,
And of the fairest late, now made the fowlest place. (II.xii.83.1-9)
Guyon’s strategic targeting of the Bower by naming key sites ensures its complete destruction. The eradication of ‘those pleasaunt bowres and Pallace braue’ until only ‘the fowlest place’ remains appears necessary, as the Bower threatens the temperance Guyon is associated with throughout Book II of The Faerie Queene. Continue reading