Edmund Spenser

SPENSER, Edmund. b. London, ca. 1552; d. Westminster, London, 13 January 1599. He was educated at Merchant Taylors’ School and Pembroke Hall, Cambridge (BA 1573, MA 1576). He was briefly secretary to John Young, bishop of Rochester, before entering the service of the Earl of Leicester (1579). In the same year he published The Shepheardes Calender. In 1580 he moved to Ireland as secretary to Lord Grey of Wilton, acquiring land there and restoring the ruined Kilcolman Castle, County Cork, ca. 1588-89. According to Ben Jonson*, the castle was burned during an Irish rebellion in October 1598, and Spenser was forced to flee with his family. He died in London, and was buried in Westminster Abbey,...