Edmund Spenser's involvement with the Earl of Leicester set the groundwork for the influential effect that "The Shepheardes Calender" would have. A year after working together, the two of them, joined by Sir Philip Sidney, Edward Dryer, and Fulke Greville, created the literary group called "Areopagus". The group they formed supported Leicester's views on religion and politics (Bear). When "The Shepheardes Calender", which was Spenser's first ever published piece, was published it was around the same time that Leicester proposed marriage between the Queen and the Duc d'Alençon.