Edmund Spenser

Sonnet 30 (Spencer)

'''Sonnet XXX'''

Petrarchan paradox reversed

Classic Petrarchan lovers are ice, ladies are fire—Spenser flips it. His mistress is cold, he burns. This inversion sets up the whole argument.

MY loue is lyke to yse, and I to fyre;
how comes it then that this her cold so great
is not dissolu'd through my so hot desyre,

Physics problem

He's treating love like natural philosophy. Fire should melt ice, ice should cool fire—but neither happens. The poem becomes a scientific puzzle.

but harder growes the more I her intreat?
Or how comes it that my exceeding heat
is not delayd by her hart frosen cold:
but that I burne much more in boyling sweat,

Augmented manifold

Mathematical language—'manifold' means multiplied many times over. His passion increases geometrically, not just grows.

and feel my flames augmented manifold?
What more miraculous thing may be told
that fire which all things melts, should harden yse:
and yse which is congeald with sencelesse cold,

Senseless cold

'Senseless' = without feeling or sensation. Her coldness is literally unfeeling, immune to his heat. Double meaning: emotionally numb and physically insensate.

should kindle fyre by wonderfull deuyse.

Gentle mind

'Gentle' = noble-born in Elizabethan usage. Love's power works specifically in aristocratic souls, not common ones. Class matters in Spenser's cosmos.

Such is the powre of loue in gentle mind,
that it can alter all the course of kynd.

Course of kynd

'Kind' = nature, the natural order. Love overrides physics itself—a huge claim. It's supernatural force, not just emotion.

<Publ. 1595>
My love is like to ice, and I to fire:
how comes it then that this her cold so great
is not dissolv'd through my so hot desire,
but harder grows, the more I her entreat?
Or how comes it that my exceeding heat
is not delayed by her heart frozen cold,
but that I burn much more in boiling sweat,

Augmented manifold

Mathematical language—'manifold' means multiplied many times over. His passion increases geometrically, not just grows.

and feel my flames augmented manifold?
What more miraculous thing may be told
that fire, which all thing melts, should harden ice:
and ice which is congealed with senseless cold,
should kindle fire by wonderful device?
Such is the pow'r of love in gentle mind
that it can alter all the course of kind.
Source Wikipedia Poetry Foundation

Reading Notes

The Scientific Method Applied to Courtship

Spenser structures this sonnet as a natural philosophy experiment gone wrong. The opening proposition—'my love is like to ice, and I to fire'—sets up what should be a predictable physical interaction. Fire melts ice. Ice cools fire. Elementary.

But the experiment fails spectacularly. Lines 2-8 pose two 'how comes it' questions that frame the problem as scientific anomaly. First anomaly: his heat doesn't melt her coldness, it hardens it (line 4's 'harder growes'). Second anomaly: her coldness doesn't cool his heat, it intensifies it ('flames augmented manifold'). Both violate the laws of nature.

The volta at line 9 shifts from questioning to marveling: 'What more miraculous thing may be told.' That word 'miraculous' is key—Spenser's moving from physics to metaphysics. The final couplet provides the explanation: love has the power to 'alter all the course of kynd' (nature). This isn't hyperbole. For Spenser, love is a cosmic force that literally overrides natural law. The poem proves it through failed physics.

Amoretti Context: The Long Game

This is Sonnet 30 from Spenser's Amoretti (1595), an 89-sonnet sequence tracking his courtship of Elizabeth Boyle, whom he married. By sonnet 30, he's been at this a while—the frustration is earned, not conventional.

Unlike Petrarchan sequences where the lady stays forever unattainable, Spenser's sequence ends in marriage (celebrated in 'Epithalamion,' published with the Amoretti). That changes how we read the cold lady. She's not a distant ideal; she's a real woman making him work for it. The 'harder growes' isn't poetic convention—it's biographical fact. Elizabeth Boyle made him wait.

The 'gentle mind' in line 13 matters here. Spenser is courting above his station—Boyle was Anglo-Irish gentry, he was a civil servant. 'Gentle' means noble-born, and he's arguing that love's transformative power works specifically in aristocratic souls. It's both compliment and social positioning: their love transcends natural law *because* they're refined enough for it to work on.