The poem “Dover Beach” by Matthew Arnold was written in nineteenth century, when the new era of industrialization and progress began and the usual world started to change. The social order and values became more dependent on the historical processes of Victorian era, while the religion and faith faced crisis. The historical background of the author caused the focus of his poetry on the themes of decay, alienation and depression. Facing the changes that were happening, seeing how two absolutely different worlds clash have stimulated Arnold to write “Dover Beach” that expresses the attitudes and moods of English population of the time. It is a manifest of the changing world that is rendered with the help of ocean image that was calm and harmonious at the beginning, but turned growling and hopeless. A person that suffers from loss of faith, morality and trust is in the center of the poem. Matthew Arnold in the poem “Dover Beach” develops the theme of spiritual alienation of a person in the emerging world that is expressed in the poem with the help of imagery and metaphors.
The development of the theme of alienation begins in the first lines of the poem with the image of the ocean. The narrator describes what he sees, and these pictures are tranquil and worriless at the first glance, “The sea is calm tonight. / The tide is full, the moon lies fair / Upon the straits;” (Arnold 1-3). It is an image of the sea, which does not seem to be the center of changes, but the description shows anticipation of the alienation that is going to come. It symbolizes the order of things that was before the alienation comes into place. The sea, as it is revealed later in the poem, is a “sea of faith”, and at the beginning, it is not hindered by emerging world of values. It can also be treated as an illusion of calmness. The sea may look as if everything is alright, but the slightest event is capable of changing it. Therefore, the first lines of the poem do not yet demonstrate the alienation of the narrator, but anticipate it with the image of calm night sea.
The theme continues to develop in the first stanza with the introduction of window image that serves as a border between the narrator and the changing world he can see through it. At first, the narrator is impersonated, but with the line “Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!” (Arnold 6), he becomes a person, who speaks the words of people of the time. However, the narrator is not named, so the reader can identify with the narrator and even become this narrator, who is separated from the reality by the divisive window. For this reason, the theme of alienation is not viewed only from the position of the author, but it is also applicable to the alienation people often have to face in the modern world. By asking to come to the window, the narrator introduces the metaphorical border between the audience and the images of Dover beach, which are seen through it. It sets the starting point of alienation, as the narrator is separated from the images of the poems, while the window creates the frame for the further stanzas. It may be explained by the fact that the author wants to make the images he describes in the form of the distant picture framed by the audience’s sight.
Introduction of the sadness element on the background of roaring sea continues developing the theme of alienation. The calm night sea is gradually turning into the wild beast, rhythmically hitting the pebbles, “Begin, and cease, and then again begin, / With tremulous cadence slow, and bring / The eternal note of sadness in” (Arnold 12-14). The rhythm of the iambic pentameter is perfectly sound to create the vivid images of the atmosphere that is getting darker. The wildness of the sea is combined with the sadness to show how the changing world is actually losing its stable ground and falling into the dark. The old well-established order is collapsing and the spirituality decays.
The rhythm makes the narrator imagine ancient Greece with Sophocles, who also watches the decaying sea of faith. It leads him to the comparison between his current alienation and Sophocles mentioning, “the turbid ebb and flow / Of human misery” (Arnold 17-18). This loss of track of time leads the narrator to the thought of the misery to observe how the faith and the truth are changed. It is what makes him feel further seclusion from the reality and helps to break the time constraints. The third stanza develops the image even further, as the narrator says directly that the value of faith is decreasing and there is nothing possible to change the situation, because there is not place in the world for trust and truth, as “now I only hear / Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar, / Retreating, to the breath” (Arnold 24-26). The world is overflown with sadness and despair, as the sea of faith is full of worrisome roars.
The tone changes in the last stanza from highly philosophical and metaphorical to personal, as the author searches a way to oppose the alienation referring to his companion. The narrator says, “Ah, love, let us be true / To one another! (Arnold 29-30) and it expresses the hope to overcome the struggle of this seclusion and problems faced by the society, as he thinks that love can help to save people. Still, he emphasizes that the life now is a battlefield, “darkling plain” (Arnold 35), and even though it may seem that there is peace, it is just an illusion. The fights and new truths isolate people from one another and do not give them a ground for peaceful, slow-paced progress.
All in all, “Dover Beach” by Matthew Arnold shows how the alienation affects an individual in the changing society. The poem presents the development of the theme of alienation with the image of tranquil ocean that is gradually overflown by sadness and misunderstanding and is willing to retreat. It symbolizes the changes of ideals, values and beliefs, which governed the society for a long time, but now are slowly decaying. The way the poem deals with alienation in the modern world allows applying it to the variety of modern situations and makes it easier for the audience to identify with the narrator. Despite the decay and alienation are usual notions in the world, the author leaves a light of hope for people, as he concludes that love can help to overcome the alienation of an individual and achieve peace.
Work Cited
Arnold, Matthew. "Dover Beach." The English Journal 54.5 (1965): 446-446. Web.
