Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold
The relationship between Matthew Arnold's poem "Dover Beach" and the theme of loss of faith in the Victorian era.
Matthew Arnold, a poet and cultural critic, focused on the full and enjoyable life in industrial society in his poetry and prose works. In the 1950s, "sage writing" emerged as a popular creative non-fiction genre in the Victorian Era, aiming to criticize and instruct the reader about social issues in philosophy, politics, history, and economics in non-technical ways.
In his poem "Dover Beach," the narrator's mental journey is depicted as a journey through the speaker's mind, representing the loss of faith and certainty that occurred due to scientific discoveries that led to more doubts about religion and Christianity. This loss of faith created uncertainty and altered the structure of society, leading to a pessimistic view of the community. The narrator is depressed without God due to the alienation created by current movements.
To translate Victorian society into this context, Arnold uses the "sea" symbol, which represents faith, religion, uncertainty, and security. The wave of the sea symbolizes change, while the pebbles represent humans wandering around with a sea of faith but never staying stable due to their doubts about religion. The sounds, pebbles, and motion mask the eternal note of sadness.
“Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.”
Arnold also uses elements of nature, first perceiving it positively, then turning it negatively due to changing effects and alienation. He attempts to capture the human experience of nature, shifting its shape paradoxically.
In the poem, Arnold uses a love image to understand the feeling of uncertainty, finding love as a proper thing to fill the gap formed because of the loss of faith in God. The poem suggests that love between people can fill and strengthen the connection between God and humankind, creating certainty through love, just as religion once did.