Dover Beach

"Dover Beach" was written in 1867 and paints a picture of what has been described as a "nightmarish world" from which the once powerful forces of Christianity has withdrawn.

The poet was looking over the English Channel from the cliffs at Dover and listening to the sad sound of the waves rushing in over the pebble beach below.

The sound, he said, was described by the ancient Greeks as a reminder of human misery. It was also like the "Sea of Faith" which was now ebbing after nearly two millennia of expansion.

The poet called on his loved one to remain firm or else it would be difficult to stay faithful to truth in the troubled world where there are never-ending rumours of war.

Matthew Arnold was born in December 1822, the son of the headmaster of the now famous Rugby School.

He was initially tutored at Rugby but, in 1841, began studying at Oxford University where he graduated in 1844.

He started teaching at Rugby but, in 1847, became Private Secretary to Lord Lansdowne who was Lord President of the Council. It was then that he published his first book of poetry.

Arnold soon took up a position as an inspector of schools and, because of the increased salary, almost immediately married Frances Wightman with whom he had six children.

He was elected Professor of Poetry at Oxford in 1857 and was apparently the first man to deliver his lectures in English instead of Latin.

In 1883 and 1884, he toured the United States where he delivered lectures on education and democracy. He retired from school inspection in 1886 but, just two years later, he suffered a heart attack and died. He was then 66 years of age.

Arnold is heralded today -- along with Tennyson and Browning -- as one of the great Victorian poets although his poetry received only mediocre reviews during his own lifetime.

Read the left column and then answer
the following questions:


Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Aegean, and it brought
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
Of human misery.

• Who was Sophocles? What was his relationship to the Aegean? (2)

[Need help?]

Sophocles was an ancient Greek philosopher. Being Greek, he lived on the shores of the Aegean Sea.

• The word "turbid" in this stanza means:
  A. thick, dark or murky;
  B. bright;
  C. cold and miserable;
  D. rough waves.

[Need help?]

"Turbid" means "thick, dark or murky".

• What is "ebb and flow"? (2)

[Need help?]

When the tide comes in or moves towards high tide, it is said to "flow". When it goes out or moves towards low tide, it is said to "ebb".

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The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furl'd.
But now I only hear.

• What figure of speech is the poet using when he says that "the Sea of Faith was once, too, at the full"? Explain. (4)

[Need help?]

The poet compares Christian Faith to the sea, saying that Faith is a sea. This is called . . . a metaphor! Having created the metaphor, the poet then describes Faith as if it were the sea, reaching to all the continents, and with a high tide and a low tide. Just as the sea flows at high tide, so did the Christian Church expand, but just as the tide ebbs away at low tide, so the Christian Church is getting weaker.

• What figure of speech is the poet using when he says that the Sea of Faith lay "like the folds of a bright girdle furl'd"? What is being compared to what? (4)

[Need help?]

The word "like" is a telltale sign of a simile! If one looks from above at the waves breaking on the seashore, one could believe that it looks like the folds of a white girdle. This simile is accentuated when one views the "Sea of Faith" or religion, which has its various vestments at religious services -- especially the Anglican and Catholic services.

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Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.

• The word "melancholy" means:
  A. overwhelming happiness;
  B. jubilation;
  C. a great sadness;
  D. very depressed.

[Need help?]

"Melancholy" means "a great sadness"! In fact, it's almost a happy sadness. Teenagers love to feel melancholy.

• List TWO words which tells you that the author believes religion is having a smaller and smaller impact on modern society. (2)

[Need help?]

"Withdrawing" and "retreating".

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Ah, love let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.

• The poet appears to be referring to a war. What words suggest this? (2)

[Need help?]

What words refer to war? "Confused alarms" of "struggle and flight" and where ignorant "armies clash" by night.

• What war would the poet be referring to? (2)

[Need help?]

Certainly not World War I or World War II. The poet was dead long before either of these wars broke out. Since the poem was written in 1867, the probability is that the poet was referring to the great Austro- Prussian War which took place in 1866, where two major nations -- Austria and Prussia -- went into battle against one another. Surprisingly Prussia, which was the seemingly less powerful state, defeated the powerful Austria in only six weeks.

• Why does the author suggest that the world "hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light, nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain"? (4)

[Need help?]

The 19th century was a time of great confusion and uncertainty in Europe. Old values and ideas were being abandoned in favour of new, more radical ideas. Religion, which had dominated Europe for centuries, was being discarded in favour of humanism. In all of this, there would be a growing need to cling to important values, like love, faithfulness, etc.

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