2.  from pastor, Latin for "shepherd”  refers to a literary work dealing with shepherds and rustic life.  The English pastoral is an imitation of the Greek and Latin literary tradition.

3.  This poetry presents an idealized rather than realistic view of rustic life.  It’s about the pleasures and simplicity of the country, not the everyday realities of life outside the city and court.

4. The pastoral mode is used to address specific topics:  love and seduction  the value of poetry  death and mourning (the elegy or eulogy)  the corruption of the city and/or court vs. the purity of country life  a satire of politics

5. Between two shepherds (called an eclogue). may discuss:  the shepherds’ flocks  current events  a lady  the death of a friend  or debate which shepherd is the better poet

6. Between a shepherd and the shepherdess he loves  generally an attempt to seduce her  may contain the shepherdess’s response, but it doesn’t have to

7. A single shepherd may also speak in a monologue This monologue may:  praise an individual  mourn a death  court a lady  or complain about being lovesick

8.  Definition: A collection of sonnets in the pastoral mode.  These are typically Spenserian sonnets but there are some variations  They fit in with a tradition of poetry in which the poet dissects the nature of love and seeks to represent it in all its pain and glory

9.  each sonnet has three quatrains (a group of four lines) and a couplet (a rhymed pair of lines)  written in rhymed iambic pentameter  A typical Spenserian sonnet will rhyme: abab bcbc cdcd ee.  “Astrophil and Stella” uses several different acceptable rhyme schemes