DOVER BEACH – MATTHEW ARNOLD

 STANZA 1 = Looking at the dover beach at night, the poet finds the sea calm and quiet, filled with water at high-tide.
The moon shines brightly upon the narrow English Channel. Staring at the French coast at a far-off distance, the poet
sees the light gleaming on it. Later, as the light goes off, he concentrates on the English shore instead. The famous cliffs
of Dover stand tall with their large wavering reflections in the quiet sea. The poet asks his companion to come to the
window to enjoy the sunset night-air coming from where the sea meets the moonlit land of France. He asks her to
listen to the continuous and the irritating sound of the pebbles drawn by the waves. The waves are drawing the stones
backwards to the sea and then again throw them back onto high shore on their return journey. The sound of the waves
begins, stops and then begins again. This trembling rhythm continues slowly. But now, it brings the eternal note of
sadness. The monotonous rhythm of the waves makes the poet depressed, hence changing the tone of the poem from
cheerful to melancholy
 STANZA 2 = Continuing with the thought of ‘eternal’ human miseries and sadness, the poet is reminded of the ancient
Greek play wright; Sophocles, who had also heard the sounds of the Aegean Sea and then written tragedies on human
misery. The images of human suffering surfaced like muddy water flowing in and out. Similar to this, the poet has also
found the feeling of sadness on hearing a similar sound beside the Northern Sea, located far away from Sophocles,
Aegean Sea, hence emphasizing upon the universality of human grief and misery
 STANZA 3 = Herein, the poet laments the lack of faith in the modern society, comparing faith with the receding tides.
Human faith, that exists in the religion and in the fellow beings, once covered the earth like the sea water. It was once
at its fullest. Faith covered the earth like the folds of a bright girdle. It was the time when faith helped in uniting people
and brought meaning to life. However, the poet regrets that those days are now a thing of past. Faith is fading away
from the society just like the waves from the shore. The poet, now, only hears the sorrowful roar of the retreating
tides. It leaves behind the chill night-wind whistling over the desolate beach with dull edges of the cliffs and raw
pebbles. The poet has, thus created a fearful picture of the underlying nakedness of the colourful modern world.
 STANZA 4 = Here, the poet urges his ladylove to ‘be true to one another’ as the new world which appears to be so
beautiful, does not evoke much hope in him. To him, this dreamy modern world is not really a source of joy, love, light,
certainty, peace or a reliever of pain. Hence, this chaotic, artificial world does not induce much hope in him. The poet
compares the new modern world to a dark place wherein we are completely unaware of what we are doing. We are in
a confused struggle as ignorant soldiers fight with each other in the darkness. Hence, the poet assesses the morally
corrupted modern world, full of vanity
 LOSS OF FAITH IN GOD AND RELIGION = ‘Dover Beach’ by Matthew Arnold bears clearly on the conflict between
traditional faith in religion and science. The validity of long standing theological and moral precepts were challenged by
scientific postulates. It is important to keep in mind that in the Victorian Age in which this poem was written saw the
fast development of science. Charles Darwin’s Theory of the Origin of the Species and many other scientific discoveries
shook people’s faith in God. The very basis of religion was eroded. The creations of mankind, according to science, was
a slow process of evolution. Man’s origin was traced to the ape or the monkey. It falsified the earlier belief that God
made man in His own image. The result was a conflict in people’s mind. Some lost faith in God, others clung to it, and
there were many, like Arnold, who wavered in their faith.
He recalls in a sad tone:

The Sea of Faith

Was once, too, at the full, and round earth’s shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing, roar,
 Matthew Arnold gives expression to people’s declining faith in religion (Christianity). In a beautiful metaphor, he
compares faith in religion to the sea of faith. Once this Sea of Faith had encircled the whole world, which means that
there was a time when the whole world was full of strong religious belief. But now that faith has declined. As the faith
declines, the harsh reality symbolized by ‘naked shingles’ leaves mankind sad and dejected. In other words, it is the
lack of faith which is accountable for much suffering and agony in the world.
Without faith the world is hollow and uncertain, devoid of peace and happiness. The people on this earth are no better
than two opposing armies fighting each other in total darkness, and thus not knowing whether they are hurting and
killing friends or their enemies. It is suggestive of the fact that when light of faith fades away, it results in a great sense
of emptiness and hopelessness.

 LOVE AS LAST SOLACE = in a world, devoid of faith, Matthew Arnold has depicted the comforting power of love.
Although the world looks new and beautiful like a land of dreams but in reality, this world does not really have joy,
love, light, peace, certitude or any help for pain. He describes the world as " a darkling plain" means a dark plain which
is becoming even darker as the time passes.
Arnold compares the world without faith in God and religion with a battlefield at night, where soldiers rush, pursuing
and firing at shadows unable to tell friend from foe; it is a dark plain
Where ignorant armies clash by night
He compares the people struggling and running in their ambitions to the armies fighting at night, unknown to why and
with whom they are fighting.
Arnold firmly believes that Christianity is dead, and his instincts tell him that humankind desires for something to
believe in something which can give force and meaning to life. The modern world, with its science and commercialism,
cannot provide what human beings desire.
Ah, love, let us be true
To one another!
Arnold believes that only love and compassion can somehow restore man's faith in religion and in the goodness of the
world. Thus, the speaker turns to his love and says that they should be true to each other, because there is nothing
else possible to give meaning to life. Love and being true to one another is an Oasis of security when turmoil abounds
in the world. This is romantic love at its most radical. Without love, between a man and a woman, the world is as
confusing and as lethal as a night battlefield.

 What is the significance of the allusion to Sophocles in the poem?

The poet hears the slow sad music of the sea. He is reminded how Sophocles heard the same sad music of the Aegean
Sea (the sea between Greece and Asia Minor). Sophocles was a great Greek playwright. The sad music of this sea
brought to Sophocles’ mind the wretchedness of human life. This inspired him to write great plays in which he
dramatizes various aspects of human misery and tragedy. The poet remarks that like Sophocles they (the poet and his
beloved) also find a note of human misery in the sound of the sea at Dover Beach. The sound of the sea, thus, gives
expression to human misery that was there in Sophocles’ times and is there in their own times.
The allusion to Sophocles is, thus, important as it generalizes the whole situation. Human misery is a universal feature.
In generalizing a particular situation, the poet wants to console us that such situations have occurred in the past, too
and will continue to recur as well. We need to accept the present state of misery as it is.

 In what sense is the poem an elegy?

The main characteristics of an elegy is to lament over the loss of some person or something in us. In Dover Beach, the
poet laments the loss of faith. The elegiac note is clearly discernible when the rhythmic sound of the waves makes the
poet sad. The whole world seems to him devoid of any hope and joy. The world, in fact,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain.
 Outwardly, the world seems to be bright but in reality, it is swallowed by darkness. The poet is sad to note that
people’s faith in religion has declined. This has caused much confusion and doubts in their minds. They have turned
against one another. The whole world is now plunged into darkness of ignorance and violence.
This melancholy note turns the poem into a sort of elegy, though it is not an elegy proper. The poet suggests a way to
survive in the midst of the soul-killing loss of faith in our world, and that is, to love and remain loyal to each other.
When nothing can redeem the situation, even a small step at the individual level in significant and necessary to solve
difficult problems.

 DRAMATIC MONOLOGUE = Dover Beach is a dramatic monologue. In a dramatic monologue, a single person, who is
not the poet, utters the speech in a specific situation that makes up the whole of the poem. The poet speaks through
the medium of an imagined character and achieves the same objectivity as a drama.
the speaker in the poem is the mouthpiece of the poet, Matthew Arnold, but not the poet himself. The imagined
character or the speaker is presumably a lover, standing at the window and describing the beauty of the seashore to
his companion - Come to the window, sweet is the night - air!
Since, dover beach is a dramatic monologue, the drama is internal that is the development occurs inside the speaker’s
mind.
The seascape begins to remind him of his uncertain place in the universe. He becomes philosophical and
contemplative. He contemplates about the loss of faith in God and religion and compares it to the ebb and flow of tide.
The concluding section provides a little relief to the speaker’s maladies. He implores his love to be true to him in life.
Thus, Arnold has skillfully blended both lyrical and dramatic elements in the poem.

 How the sea is used both as a physical presence and as a metaphor in Mathew Arnold's ‘Dover Beach’? Write a note on
Arnold's use of seascape.
The sea is everywhere in ‘Dover Beach’. It shows up at different places and in different forms, but its power can be felt
all over the place. At times, it’s a physical location that one can actually see like the English Channel or the Aegean Sea
and sometimes it morphs into a metaphor for the fate of humanity. The opening line of the poem itself focuses on the
simple image of the sea. We start with this calm and vivid picture in our heads and from there, everything slowly
dissolves away to an extent that towards the end, the poet strips away our illusions by showing us the nightmare
behind this calm ocean. Another important and powerful image is of the sea meeting the land. Arnold spends long
enough time to make the readers really see the vision of the coast of England in the moonlight. Speaking about the
Aegean Sea, he connects himself to Sophocles, hence the sea becomes a part of historical illusion. Also, the sound of
the rising and falling tide is used as an analogy for the “ebb and flow of human misery”. One of the major uses of
referring the sea in the poem is in, turning it into a metaphor for the human belief in a higher power. The real sea of
the English Channel is re-imagined as a ‘Sea of Faith’.