Matthew Arnold
Possible Lines of Approach
Arnold as elegiac poet
Arnold as poet of loneliness
Arnold as harbinger of modernity
Arnold as literary and cultural critic and social reformer
Notes on Approaching Particular Works
“The Forsaken Merman”
“Isolation. To Marguerite” and “To Marguerite—Continued”
“The Buried Life”
“The Scholar-Gipsy”
“Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse”
“Dover Beach”
“East London” and “West London”
“Preface to the First Edition of Poems”
Excerpt from “The Function of Criticism at the Present Time”
Excerpt from Culture and Anarchy, Chapter 1: “Sweetness and Light”
Suggested Reading
Possible Lines of Approach
Arnold as elegiac poet
•
Much of Arnold’s verse can be classified as elegiac. He is considered by many to
be (along with Tennyson) the most melancholy Victorian poet, and a sense of loss,
grief, and mourning pervades much of his poetry. All but two of the poems
included in the Broadview Anthology of British Literature (“East London” and
“West London”) lend themselves to being read with this approach in mind.
Arnold as poet of loneliness
•
Arnold has also been called the poet of Victorian loneliness. Loneliness and human
isolation are central themes in almost all his love poetry, and appear in much of the
remainder of his poetry. Again, all but “East London” and “West London” among
the poems included in the anthology will serve well the purpose of considering
loneliness as central to Arnold’s poetry.
Arnold as harbinger of modernity
•
Arnold articulates much of what we generally consider “modern”—in terms of
thought, emotion, and urban existence. The chaos, hurry, and perplexity of
modernity (what he called its “multitudinousness”) that left people divided,
confused, and deeply isolated from one another are perhaps nowhere else more
poignantly expressed among Victorian intellectuals than in Arnold’s work. Except
for “The Forsaken Merman,” all of the works included here touch upon this issue in
one way or another.
Arnold as literary and cultural critic and social reformer
•
The excerpts from the prose pieces included in the anthology will speak well to the
tremendous influence of Arnold on twentieth-century literary critics such as T. S.
Eliot and F. R. Leavis, among many others. Arnold is better remembered by many
as a critic rather than a poet. His work as inspector of schools led to his extensive
publication on the subjects of education, social reform, and religion. See, in
addition to the prose pieces, “East London” and “West London” among his poems.
Notes on Approaching Particular Works
“The Forsaken Merman”
•
•
Date of composition is unknown: sometime between 1847 and 1849.
First published in 1849 in Arnold’s first volume of verse: The Strayed Reveller and
Other Poems; reprinted many times thereafter.
Form: Arnold listed “The Forsaken Merman” among his narrative poems (which fact
raises an interesting question about form and genre, discussed below under “Lines of
Inquiry and Discussion Questions”). But in several respects it is closer in form to the
dramatic monologue. The poem consists of 143 lines, traditionally divided into 9 stanzas.
Both meter and rhyme scheme are irregular.
Background Notes: “The Forsaken Merman” remains one of Arnold’s most highly
anthologized poems. Early reviewers of The Strayed Reveller and Other Poems for the
most part admired “The Forsaken Merman.” Scottish poet and writer William
Edmonstoune Aytoun, a contemporary of Arnold’s, deemed it the best poem in the
volume. Another contemporary, novelist Charles Kingsley, called the poem “the gem of
the book.”
The opinions of twentieth-century critics are varied with regard to “The Forsaken
Merman.” In The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism (1933), for example, T. S. Eliot
calls the poem a charade. In their article, “Arnold the Poet: Narrative and Dramatic
Poems,” Kenneth and Miriam Allott claim that Arnold’s choice of an old Danish folktale
for the poem’s narrative content came (as it did for a few of his other poems) from “an
impulse to discover through the reworking of a series of fictional events an answer to
emotional disquiet.”1 Norman Friedman reads the poem as one of several that have the
potential to “indicate transitionally where [the] movements [of Romanticism,
Victorianism, and Modernism] are similar and where they are not.” Hence, he uses “The
Forsaken Merman” to show the continuities “between the nineteenth and the twentieth
centuries in poetry and poetic theory.” 2
1
Kenneth Allott, “Arnold the Poet: Narrative and Dramatic Poems,” in Writers and Their Background:
Matthew Arnold (Columbus: Ohio University Press, 1976): 82.
2
Norman Friedman, “The Young Matthew Arnold, 1847-49: ‘The Strayed Reveller’ and ‘The Forsaken
Merman’,” Victorian Poetry 9 (1971): 405-28.
Most scholars are in agreement about the source of Arnold’s poem. As Herbert Wright
declares, “The story of the merman who marries a maiden and is afterwards abandoned
by her is one that has enjoyed considerable popularity in several countries.”3 In Arnold’s
particular case, however, critics settle, more or less, on the probability of Arnold’s
primary source being either Borrow’s English translation of an Old Danish ballad called
“The Deceived Merman,” which appeared in an 1826 volume of poems called Romantic
Ballads Translated from the Danish, or Borrow’s prose version of the same story in a
review he wrote in 1825 of Just Mathias Thiele’s Danske Folkesagn (Danish Popular
Ballads)4. An excerpt from Borrow’s prose account is given below for purposes of
comparison with Arnold’s poem:
There lived once two poor people near Friesenborg … who had only one child …
called Grethe. One day that they sent her down to the sea-shore to fetch some
sand, as she was washing her apron, a merman arose out of the water … She let
herself be prevailed on, and he took her by the hand, and brought her down to the
bottom of the sea, and she in the course of time became the mother of five
children. When a long time had passed over, and she had nearly forgotten all she
knew of religion, one festival morning as she was sitting with her youngest child
in her lap, she heard the church bells ringing above, and there came over her mind
great uneasiness, and an anxious longing to go to church. And as she sat there
with her children, and sighed heavily, the merman observed her affliction, and
enquired what made her so melancholy. She then coaxed him, and earnestly
entreated him to let her go once more to church. The merman could not withstand
her tears and solicitations, so he set her on the land, and charged her strictly to
make haste back to the children. In the middle of the sermon, the merman came to
the outside of the church, and cried “Grethe! Grethe!” She heard him plainly, but
she thought she might as well stay till the service was over. When the sermon was
concluded, the merman came again to the church, and cried, “Grethe, Grethe! will
you come quick?” but still she did not stir. He came once more … and cried
“Grethe! Grethe! will you come quick? Your children are crying for you.” But
when she did not come, he began to weep bitterly, and went back to the bottom of
the sea. But Grethe ever after stayed with her parents, and let the merman himself
take care of his ugly little children, and his weeping and lamentation have been
often heard from the bottom of the deep.5
General Themes for Exploration
•
Primitive nature vs. Christian community (paganism vs. Christianity)
•
Individual, emotional freedom vs. ordered society, duty, morality (self vs. society)
•
Irreducible (emotional and/or spiritual) conflict
•
Loss in love
•
Landscape imagery (and its symbolism)
3
Herbert Wright, “The Source of Matthew Arnold’s ‘Forsaken Merman’,” Modern Language Review 13
(1918): 90-94.
4
Another possible source is a story told by Hans Christian Andersen in The Story of My Life.
5
Quoted in C. B. Tinker and H. F. Lowry, eds., The Poetry of Matthew Arnold: A Commentary (London:
Oxford University Press, 1940).
Lines of Inquiry and Discussion Questions
1.
Arnold placed “The Forsaken Merman,” in its published form, among his narrative
poems. In Arnold’s Poetic Landscapes, Alan Roper reacts to Arnold’s choice,
claiming that “[t]he classification is … indefensible…. There is certainly narrative
content in the poem, but its mode is plainly that of monologue, a Victorian version
of the old complaint.”6 Tinker and Lowry (in their Commentary, quoted above)
refer to the source of the poem as a “ballad” and call the content that of a “myth.”
Raymond Macdonald Alden makes reference to a “legend,”7 while Kenneth and
Miriam Allott read the opening lines of the poem in terms of “a lyric cry.”8
Such comments invite an exploration of the generic possibilities of the poem. What
are the differences between myth and legend, between folklore and ballad? What
are the narrative qualities of each? How might Arnold have justified the choice of
placing “The Forsaken Merman” among his narrative poems? Do you agree with
the choice? Why or why not? What is the definition of a dramatic monologue (one
of the most well-developed and commonly occurring poetic forms during the
Victorian period)? Does this poem qualify as a dramatic monologue, and if so,
which elements account for the qualification? Some critics argue that sympathy on
the part of the reader for the speaker of a poem is one mark of a dramatic
monologue. Is Arnold successful in evoking the reader’s sympathy for the
Merman? If so, how does Arnold achieve this effect? What value is there in
considering the poem to be essentially narrative in character? What value is there in
considering it dramatic? What, if any, are its lyric qualities? Look up “ballad
stanza” as a stanzaic form. Do any of the prosodic attributes in the poem point to an
attempt on Arnold’s part to incorporate into his poem elements of the ballad as a
literary form? (This question may lead to a fruitful discussion about meter and
rhyme.)
2.
6
Related to the issue of genre is that of perspective. The point of view of the poem’s
speaker is significant not only in connection with our understanding of this poem,
but also in settling generic issues. The speaker’s voice and perspective are
especially important to the genre of dramatic monologue. What can you tell about
the speaker of the poem? Who is he? There seem to occur shifts in perspective,
shifts in voice, shifts in time, that can be read as inconsistent or even contradictory.
What do you make of these? Why do particular lines occur in quotes and others
not? Can you trace a logic to Arnold’s use of quoted lines?
Alan Roper, Arnold’s Poetic Landscapes (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1969).
Raymond Macdonald Alden, Poems of the English Race (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1921).
8
Kenneth Allott and Miriam Allott, “Arnold the Poet: Narrative and Dramatic Poems,” in Writers and
Their Background: Matthew Arnold (Columbus: Ohio University Press, 1976).
7
Connections and Discussion Questions
1.
In “A Reader’s Guide to Arnold,” Fraser Neiman writes that Arnold’s “sense of the
relative and of flux finds expression in poems of estrangement and
alienation—‘The Forsaken Merman’ comes to mind.”9 In fact, estrangement and
alienation are common themes in many of Arnold’s poems. Often, the landscapes
he depicts (more often than not, dominated by water) contribute to the loneliness of
his poems in both mood and content. Compare the sense of loneliness and/or
alienation in “The Forsaken Merman” with that of “Isolation. To Marguerite,” “To
Marguerite—Continued,” “The Buried Life,” and “Dover Beach” (with particular
attention to water imagery and its symbolic value).
2.
Rhythmical variations are but one point of prosody. Others come into play in “The
Forsaken Merman,” especially given the ballad form: chants and repetitions, for
example. Explore how elements of prosody contribute to the sound quality and
mood of “The Forsaken Merman.” An especially interesting poem for comparative
purposes here is Tennyson’s “Mariana in the Moated Grange.”
3.
The other poems by Arnold included in the anthology deal more directly with their
respective subject matters: with the exception of “The Scholar-Gipsy” (which, in
any case, is based on local legend), there is no borrowing from ancient myth,
legend, or folklore for the main content of a given poem. How does “The Forsaken
Merman” stand apart from the others? How does it fit in with them? How does it
contribute to the reader’s understanding of Arnold as poet?
4.
A comparative reading of the particulars of Borrow’s prose version of the Danish
ballad (given above) with those of Arnold’s poem might well yield interesting
results.
“Isolation. To Marguerite” and “To Marguerite—Continued”
•
•
Both poems are thought to have been composed in 1849.
“Isolation. To Marguerite” was first published in 1857, while “To
Marguerite—Continued” appeared earlier (in a volume of 1852).
Form: These two lyric love poems are often regarded as companion pieces; not only does
the line of argument continue from one poem to the next, but the sense of continuation is
also reflected in the stanza form. “Isolation. To Marguerite” consists of 7 sextets in
iambic tetrameter, rhyming ababcc, and “To Marguerite—Continued” consists of 4 such
stanzas. (This is the same stanza form Arnold used for “Stanzas from the Grande
Chartreuse.”)
9
Fraser Neiman, “A Reader’s Guide to Arnold,” in Writers and Their Background: Matthew Arnold
(Columbus: Ohio University Press, 1976).
Background Notes: “Isolation. To Marguerite” and “To Marguerite—Continued” belong
to a series of lyrics entitled “Switzerland.” Tinker and Lowry, in their Commentary,
provide us with the biographical circumstances of the poems, namely those concerning
the person of Marguerite. She was, as Stuart Sherman succinctly summarizes, “a French
girl” whom Arnold met before his marriage, and “who exercised over him for a while a
very considerable fascination; … in the first spell of this attraction he dreamed of that
perfect union of harmonious spirits which poets celebrate….”10 Tinker and Lowry inform
us that “[u]ntil the publication of Arnold’s letters to Clough in the winter of 1932, it had
often been assumed that the whole affair and all the poems springing out of it were
imaginary.” We now know that she was a historical reality—but because so little
evidence has come down to us, Marguerite remains, for readers, “what in truth she
became to the poet himself—the animating figure in a dream.” Tinker and Lowry offer a
sound approach to the biographical matter regarding the poems:
We believe, then, that the ‘Switzerland’ poems had their inception in certain
definite events of the years 1848-9; that in the course of their creation they were
altered and freely idealized according to the mood of the poet. No more than this,
the natural process by which poetry comes into being, is perhaps needed to
account for the poet’s assertion to his daughters that the experience related was
imaginary.11
General Themes for Exploration
•
Human isolation
•
Longing
•
Difficulty of love (especially in the modern world)
•
Humanity’s relationship with God
•
Water imagery (as symbolic)
•
Extended metaphor
Lines of Inquiry and Discussion Questions
1.
Explore how the evocation of a classical myth functions in “Isolation. To
Marguerite.” What does it do for the poem?
2.
“To Marguerite—Continued” contains an exceptionally cohesive extended
metaphor from start to finish, involving land and water features. It unfolds
gradually and beautifully, and makes its full meaning known to the reader by the
poem’s end. However, necessarily because of the intricacy of the extended
metaphor, its meaning and impact may be lost on students. A series of questions
that illuminate the specifics involved in the metaphor might prove helpful to
students. For example, each of the land and water features in the poem symbolizes
something. If the sea symbolizes life, then what does each of the others symbolize?
Or: in the second stanza, nature is in motion—several things are happening, all
expressed metaphorically. Liberate the meaning from the metaphor. What, in terms
10
11
Stuart P. Sherman, Matthew Arnold: How to Know Him (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1968).
Tinker and Lowry, eds., The Poetry of Matthew Arnold: A Commentar.
of human action and emotion, do you think is happening in the stanza? Or: for what
do the “islands” long? Quote the exact line.
Connections and Discussion Questions
1.
Clinton Machann writes that “To Marguerite—Continued” and “other poems in the
[Switzerland] series … express individual isolation and desperate longing for union
with another through romantic love [and] anticipate ‘The Buried Life’ and ‘Dover
Beach’.”12 Comparative readings of the two Marguerite poems with “Dover Beach”
and “The Buried Life” as love poems might lead to interesting discussions. Water
appears repeatedly throughout Arnold’s love poems as symbolic image or in a
metaphor. Feelings of despair, anger, hopelessness, and/or anxiety (and their
respective articulations) over the subject of love also appear variously in each of
these poems. Discuss.
2.
Although “Isolation. To Marguerite” and “To Marguerite—Continued” are
considered companion poems, interesting differences exist between them in the
speaker’s tone and emotional impulse or movement of thought. Discuss.
3.
Whereas “To Marguerite—Continued” is definitively lyric in its tendency to reflect
the thoughts and emotions of the speaker without being addressed to anyone in
particular, “Isolation. To Marguerite” has two addressees: Marguerite and the
speaker’s heart. How does this fact function to create particular differences between
the poems?
“The Buried Life”
•
•
Date of composition unknown, but sometime between 1849 and 1852.
First published in 1852 and reprinted several times thereafter.
Form: Lyric poem in 98 lines, divided into 8 stanzas of unequal length. Both meter and
rhyme scheme are irregular, though rhyming couplets occur frequently throughout.
Background Notes: “The Buried Life” is generally considered to be a love poem, but
also one in which the subject of love gives occasion for reflections about the self and selfknowledge. The broad subject of love is treated by way of focus on a more specific
theme: the difficulty of true communion with another in the modern world. The addressee
of the poem is presumably Marguerite (of the Marguerite poems). The topic of soulsearching is touched upon by the following gloss offered by Dwight Culler:
Arnold’s problem is illuminated by his letter to Clough written from Thun,
September 23, [1849]: “I feel that with me a clear almost palpable intuition (damn
the logical sense of the word) is necessary before I get into prayer…. [My] one
12
Clinton Machann, Matthew Arnold: A Literary Life (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1998).
natural craving is not for profound thoughts, mighty spiritual workings etc. etc.
but a distinct seeing of my way as far as my own nature is concerned….”13
General Themes for Exploration
•
Love
•
Love in the modern world; the impossibility of communion with another in the
modern world
•
Soul-searching and self-knowledge
•
Language; communication
•
Water imagery (as symbolic)
•
(Extended) metaphor as poetic device
Lines of Inquiry and Discussion Questions
1.
A “buried life” refers, at base, not only to the unconscious, but also to the
“self”—the “inmost soul”—that resides beneath the social persona. The central
theme of “The Buried Life” is the deep exploration of the self in the interest of selfknowledge, and the instrumentality of love in bringing the “true self” to the surface
of consciousness. But why or how, in the first place, does the self become
“buried”? Why does the spiritual exercise of meditating on the question of the self
involve, in the Victorian period, what William Madden calls “debilitating doubt
and introspection”?14 Stuart Sherman offers a possible response when he writes that
Arnold
felt in the depths of his being the need of a being outside himself—supreme,
beneficent, eternal—to whose continuous effort through the ages he might
unite his own will and workings, and so redeem them from insignificance and
quick perdition. He lived, however, in an age when the power and the
consolation which come from certitude in this great matter were not easily to
be had.15
Do you agree with Sherman’s assessment? Is the loss of God, in fact, at the bottom
of the “burial” of the self—of the alienation of the unconscious from
consciousness? What evidence does the poem offer in support of or against
Sherman’s opinion? Or does a “buried self” result, instead, from stoicism,
insecurity, or invulnerability? Is it simply the condition that ensues from the
impossibility of communing with another/others? How does love act as an
“anodyne”—as remedy—for such alienation? What comparisons can you make
between Arnold’s treatment of this theme in “The Buried Life” and that in “Dover
Beach”?
13
Dwight Culler, Poetry and Criticism of Matthew Arnold (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1961).
William Madden, Matthew Arnold: A Study of the Aesthetic Temperament in Victorian England
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1967).
15
Sherman, Matthew Arnold: How to Know Him.
14
2.
Explore the theme of language and/or communication in “The Buried Life.” The
first line reads: “Light flows our war of mocking words …” and hence establishes
the presence of words as important to the main themes of the poem. David Riede
asserts that the poem is “concerned with the limitations of language” and that
“Arnold consistently blamed the complexities of the age—its ‘multitudinousness,’
its rush, its ‘unpoetrylessness’—for the benumbed sense and failures of
communication.” 16 Other critics have pointed to the meandering quality of the
philosophical argumentation behind the speaker’s search for the self. Alan Roper,
for example, writes that the metaphors in the poem “attempt to render an
imperfectly understood perception.”17 How does this discursive quality of the poem
enact the anxieties involved in a search for the buried self in a world where real
communion and communication are thought to be impossible?
Connections and Discussion Questions
1.
Potentially fruitful connections can be made between “The Buried Life” and the
other love poems included in the anthology, namely “Dover Beach,” “Isolation. To
Marguerite,” and “To Marguerite—Continued.” What picture can one derive of
Arnold’s view of romantic love? How does Arnold treat love symbolically and/or
figuratively? What shape, in contrast, does his literal treatment of love take? How
is love implicated in his other, conventionally “Victorian,” concerns about life—his
concern over modern life, the present vs. the past, the disintegration of culture, the
loss of faith, etc.?
“The Scholar-Gipsy”
•
•
Exact date of composition unknown; conjectured to be 1852-1853.
First published in 1853 in Poems, reprinted many times thereafter.
Form: This is a lyric poem, specifically in the form of a pastoral elegy. The poem
employs many of the conventions of a pastoral elegy, invoking the examples of
Theocritus, Virgil, Milton’s “Lycidas,” and Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country
Churchyard.” Critics have also pointed out the strong influence of Keatsian odes. The
stanza form follows that of the English ode; this “quest romance” is presented in 250
lines of 25 ten-line stanzas, predominantly in iambic pentameter, rhyming abcbcadeed.
Background: Consult the footnote at the start of the poem in the Broadview Anthology of
British Literature for a reference regarding the source from which “The Scholar-Gipsy”
took its inspiration—Joseph Glanvill’s Vanity of Dogmatizing.
On May 15, 1857, Arnold wrote in a letter to his brother, Tom:
You alone of my brothers are associated with that life at Oxford, the freest and
most delightful part, perhaps, of my life, when with you and Clough and Walrond
I shook off all the bonds and formalities of the place, and enjoyed the spring of
16
David G. Riede, Matthew Arnold and the Betrayal of Language (Charlottesville: University Press of
Virginia, 1988).
17
Roper, Arnold’s Poetic Landscapes.
life and that unforgotten Oxfordshire and Berkshire country. Do you remember a
poem of mine called “The Scholar Gipsy”? It was meant to fix the remembrance
of those delightful wanderings of ours in the Cumner Hills.
The freedom, youth, and carefree “wandering” to which Arnold refers are personified in
the image of the Scholar-Gipsy, the central figure of the poem.
Arnold made only modest claims for the affective powers of the poems if we are to take
at face value a much earlier letter, dated November 30, 1853, to his closest friend, Arthur
Hugh Clough: “I am glad you like the Gipsy Scholar—but what does it do for you?
Homer animates—Shakespeare animates—in its poor way I think Sohrab and Rustum
animates—the Gipsy Scholar at best awakens a pleasing melancholy.”
The poem belongs to Arnold’s romantic side: it is given over to the kind of melancholic
musing from which he later turned away with his decision to strike “Empedocles on
Aetna” from his Poems of 1853. For more on this, see his famous Preface to the Poems,
and the background notes to the Preface. Kenneth Allott tells us that the letter to Tom as
well as Arnold’s “classification of the poem as an elegy show that it should be read as a
lament for the ways in which wholeheartedness and energy of youth are sapped by life in
the world.”18 Tinker and Lowry inform us, in their Commentary, that “The ScholarGipsy” was “from the first, a favourite with the readers of Arnold’s poetry, and has often
been considered his masterpiece.”19
General Themes for Exploration
•
The “sick hurry” and chaos of modern life vs. the natural/rural spirit of humankind
•
Hyperconsciousness, confusion, and uncertainty (“multitudinousnes”) as conditions
of the modern mind
•
Nostalgia for a simpler past—for both self and society
•
The dilemma of a creative mind’s desire both to engage with and withdraw from
society
•
The tradition of the pastoral elegy
•
Poetic landscape as symbol
•
The quest romance as genre
•
Idealization of rural over and against urban existence
•
Escapism
Lines of Inquiry and Discussion Questions
1.
18
19
William Madden reads “The Scholar-Gipsy” as presenting “momentary
withdrawals from society into solitude as occasions of self renewal.” He continues
to propose that “[o]n the strength of his dream-vision the speaker succeeds in
fleeing for a time the dispiriting modern age to a poetic country of the mind where
he can refresh his spirit and renew his hope…. the Scholar-Gipsy moves as an
Kenneth Allott, ed. The Poems of Matthew Arnold (New York: Barnes and Noble, Inc. 1965).
Tinker and Lowry, eds., The Poetry of Matthew Arnold: A Commentary.
image of Arnold’s own buried self.”20 One way of approaching the theme of the
individual vs. society that appears in “The Scholar-Gipsy” is to consider it in terms
of the dilemma articulated by several Victorian intellectuals and poets (Tennyson,
Browning, and Arnold among them) of withdrawal from or engagement with
society. Should a poet be of the world, or simply in the world? How does the poem
raise and resolve (if it indeed does) this issue? Discuss the complexities of the
predicament as they are revealed by the poem.
2.
The most immediately recognizable dichotomy in “The Scholar-Gipsy” is
expressed in terms of the (idyllic) past against the (chaotic) present—of the desire
to preserve the unity, wholeness, and stability of one’s personal as well as the
historical past in the face of the perplexing “sick fatigue” of modernity. Critics have
written extensively along this line. Douglas Bush, for example, calls the poem “a
parable of the modern spirit’s … lonely quest of unity and totality.”21 He
recognizes the poem’s predominant theme as that of “the melancholy transition
from sanguine youth to disenchanted age, a changed self in a changed world.”
David Riede characterizes the theme as “the need and possibility of clinging to a
pastoral dream in an industrial world.” For Riede, the loss experienced by the
speaker is the loss of youth, of mythic wholeness, and of joy, in place of which the
speaker “confronts the wasteland of modern life” and a “sense of purposeless
drifting.” 22 And Alan Roper’s interpretation of the dichotomy is expressed as the
poem’s confirmation of “the possibility of good dreams in bad times.”23 Discuss the
possibilities suggested here both by the secondary sources and by the poem itself.
3.
William Buckler argues that Arnold, like other Victorian intellectuals, judged
the present against a romanticized ideal of the past. It was, after all, the
habitual strategy of his age, the strategy of Scott, Pugin, Ruskin, Carlyle,
Tennyson, Morris and others. In this respect the literary, poetic ideal of the
Scholar-Gipsy is not merely irrelevant but pernicious, for it leads to an
overharsh condemnation of the present and an unnecessary despair.24
Arnold himself considered this kind of “despair” to be morbid, and unfit for poetic
expression (see his Preface to Poems), and ultimately turned from it to prose. Do
you find in “The Scholar-Gipsy” evidence of nostalgia for a past that is idealized?
A past that never did exist? Or a past, perhaps, that is vague and elusive? Or is
there something concrete in the past for which the speaker yearns? Something
tangible and possibly still accessible?
20
Madden, Matthew Arnold: A Study of the Aesthetic Temperament in Victorian England.
Douglas Bush, Matthew Arnold: A Survey of His Poetry and Prose (New York: Macmillan, 1971).
22
Riede, Matthew Arnold and the Betrayal of Language.
23
Roper, Arnold’s Poetic Landscapes.
24
Quoted in Riede, Matthew Arnold and the Betrayal of Language.
21
4.
“The Scholar-Gipsy” is understood by many to be a “quest romance.” A quest, by
definition, is purpose-driven, but the object of the Scholar-Gipsy’s quest is
uncertain; he seems to be wandering aimlessly, rather than searching for anything.
Riede interprets this departure as the “precariousness of Arnold’s vision of an ideal
outside the hurly-burly of modern life.”25 The Scholar-Gipsy’s happiness seems
undercut by his alienation from the locals who spot him; he is entirely elusive and
rather melancholy. Do you read this as Arnold’s ambivalence regarding an
alternative to modern existence? Is such an expression of alternative even possible?
Does any such alternative inevitably involve an aimless wandering that is no better
than the “purposeless multitudinousness” of the mainstream modern life? Is the
Scholar-Gipsy’s existence preferable, regardless?
Connections and Discussion Questions
1.
Riede treats on the “The Scholar-Gipsy” as a pastoral elegy, and claims that
by using an extremely conventional form, Arnold could exploit universal
rather than personal associations. He could, for example, exploit the
traditional juxtaposition of an idealized pastoral landscape with a harsher
actuality in order to demonstrate the inadequacies of modern life and the
extent of the fall from a better, simpler world.26
Do you agree with Riede’s assessment? How does borrowing from a classical (or
other conventional poetic form) potentially function for a poet? How does it
potentially shape the content of the poem? Critics have also noted Arnold’s
borrowing from the English ode, particular from those of Keats. A comparison
between the content of “The Scholar-Gipsy” and that of Keats’s “Ode to a
Nightingale” or “Ode to Autumn,” given their shared structural elements, might
prove fruitful. Comparisons can also be made with traditional pastoral elegies of
the kind mentioned above under “Form.”
2.
The speaker entreats the Scholar-Gipsy to “fly our paths, our feverish contact fly!/
… fly our greetings, fly our speech and smiles!” He seems vexed by the idea that
the Scholar-Gipsy’s contact with modern life might adulterate his spirit. The monks
in the Grande Chartreuse seek severance from modern life and wish to remain
cloistered in their monastery. A “break” and concomitant withdrawal seem
necessary in both these cases for the sake of preserving something considered
precious. Discuss.
3.
The poetic figure of the Scholar-Gipsy and his wanderings and the poetic
metaphors (involving water, in particular) in “The Buried Life” enact the
meandering purposelessness and/or chaos they are meant to depict and combat.
Comment with regard to both poems.
25
26
Riede, Matthew Arnold and the Betrayal of Language.
Riede, Matthew Arnold and the Betrayal of Language.
“Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse”
•
•
Date of composition unknown; conjectured to be between 1851 and 1855.
First published in Fraser’s Magazine in April of 1855; reprinted first in 1867 and
many times thereafter.
Form: Lyric poem, classified (in its 1877 reprint) among Arnold’s elegiac poems (which
invites the question: what is being mourned?). The poem, 210 lines in length, consists of
35 sextets (6-line stanzas) in iambic tetrameter, rhyming ababcc.
Background Notes: The Grande Chartreuse is a monastery in the French Alps (see
footnote in the Anthology). Tinker and Lowry inform us that “Arnold’s visit to the
Grande Chartreuse occurred on Sunday, September 7, 1851, while he was on his wedding
journey.”27 The Grande Chartreuse was a symbol for Arnold, not a precise reality; he did
not trouble to depict the descriptive details respecting the Carthusian monks and their
practices with complete accuracy. As the writers of the Commentary note, the poem
“embodies Arnold’s opinion of the ecclesiastical tendencies of the day and, in particular,
of that which directed attention back to the ancient institutions and practices of the
Church” (that is, Arnold’s own Anglican Church, rather than that of the Carthusians).
General Themes for Exploration
•
Spiritual withdrawal from the world
•
(Victorian) religious doubt; loss of faith
•
(Victorian) rationalism
•
Nostalgia for the past
•
Mourning
•
Escapism
•
The Romantic landscape
Lines of Inquiry and Discussion Questions
1.
27
The main theme of the poem is, arguably, the grief, longing, and alienation felt
over the loss of faith. The poem’s speaker makes a journey (some might say a
pilgrimage) to the Grande Chartreuse. Critics have conjectured about the
possibilities behind the purpose of the journey; the speaker does not make his
purpose entirely clear, despite lines such as “Approach, for what we seek is here!”
or “Their faith, my tears, the world deride—/ I come to shed them at their side.”
Scholars argue that the journey is undertaken as “a quest for inward peace”28 or as a
journey “not in renewed faith but in the vague expectation that in this ‘desert’ of
the past he will find the peace that comes with the death of desire.”29 Is the “death
of desire”—a sense of detachment often associated with Eastern spiritualism—the
purpose of the speaker’s journey? Based on details from the poem, what other
“quest” might have led him to the Grande Chartreuse? What does the speaker claim
has led him there? Is he there for a purpose other than that of mourning the loss of
Tinker and Lowry, eds., The Poetry of Matthew Arnold: A Commentary.
Fraser Neiman, Matthew Arnold (New York: Twayne, 1968).
29
Madden, Matthew Arnold: A Study of the Aesthetic Temperament in Victorian England.
28
something he holds dear? Of what does “mourning” consist, as revealed by the
poem? Do you read the poem as an elegy? Why or why not?
2.
For the young Arnold, Romanticism and a strong Christian faith both belonged
together. As William Madden comments in “Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse”
the “speaker’s deep religious melancholy … indicates the deep and important
connection between Romanticism and Christianity in Arnold’s experience.”30
Fraser Neiman agrees, noting that the poem “evokes with charming Romantic
melancholy a sadly Arcadian image of Alpine meadows filled with autumn
crocuses.”31 Do you read the poem as a romantic/Romantic poem? Which, if any,
elements (formal, structural, thematic, etc.) in the poem can be classified as
romantic/Romantic?
3.
William Madden argues that “[a] paralysis of indecision lies at the center of the
poem; the narrator is no longer able to entertain the fruitless dream of Romantic
aspirations.”32 This line of thought is possibly supported by the most famous lines
from the poem: “Wandering between two worlds, one dead,/ The other powerless
to be born.” How do you read the psychological movement of the speaker? Is there
a movement toward regaining or reestablishing faith? (Has the speaker journeyed to
the Grande Chartreuse despite his loss of faith, or do you read in the poem the
possibility of hope for renewed faith?) Is there a movement further away from
faith? Or is there, in fact, a “paralysis of indecision” in the speaker’s psyche? And
if so, what “decision” is at issue? Does the speaker’s tone intimate a possible death
wish?
Connections and Discussion Questions
1.
30
Alan Roper calls “Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse” Arnold’s “most
consistently and overtly escapist poem.”33 A comparative reading between this and
other “escapist” poems might be of interest here. Consider, among those included
in the anthology, “The Scholar-Gipsy,” “Obermann Once More,” and even “Dover
Beach.” A closely related theme is that of (spiritual) withdrawal from the modern
world. Borrow from the discussion questions under the “Lines of Inquiry” and
“Connections” sections for “The Scholar-Gipsy.”
Madden, Matthew Arnold: A Study of the Aesthetic Temperament in Victorian England.
Neiman, Matthew Arnold.
32
Madden, Matthew Arnold: A Study of the Aesthetic Temperament in Victorian England.
33
Roper, Arnold’s Poetic Landscapes.
31
2.
William Madden poignantly observes that
once the consolations of the memory of early joys, the peace of nature, or the
charm of a lost past were seen as intellectually dishonest as well as harmful
to activity, the only alternative was to confront the modern self-consciousness
created by the dialogue of the mind with itself.34
Many of Arnold’s poems in one capacity or another treat the phenomenon
described above (“The Scholar-Gipsy,” “Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse,”
“Obermann Once More,” and “Dover Beach,” to name a few). Discuss how the
prose pieces included in the anthology stand against this aesthetic of nostalgia,
romanticism, and poetic melancholy. How, in essence, does Arnold respond in his
prose to the “dishonesty” or “harmfulness” of the very inactivity to which he gives
voice in his poetry?
3.
The theme of an idealized childhood and an idealized historical past runs clearly
through several of Arnold’s poems. It might be helpful for students to engage in a
comparative reading of this kind of nostalgia as it is expressed in “Stanzas from the
Grande Chartreuse,” “The Scholar-Gipsy,” and “Obermann Once More,” and to
discover there points of similarity and difference.
4.
How does the romanticism/Romanticism of “Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse”
differ (in landscape, tone, sentiment, etc.) from that of “The Scholar-Gipsy”?
5.
Examine the connections between Arnold’s opinion of the Romantic poets as it is
given (both implicitly and explicitly) in “Stanzas from the Grand Chartreuse” and
in his Preface to Poems. How are the prose and poetic representations different?
What, in your opinion, about the two forms (prose and poetry) accounts for any of
these differences?
6.
It might be of interest to students to find out about a 2005 documentary about the
Grande Chartreuse by Philip Groning called “Into Great Silence.”
“Dover Beach”
•
•
Date of composition is conjectured to be 1851, during Arnold’s wedding trip to
Dover.
First published in 1867 in New Poems, and reprinted many times thereafter.
Form: Generally considered a lyric poem (and listed in several volumes among Arnold’s
lyric poems), “Dover Beach” has also been called a dramatic monologue by virtue of its
structure (but not its substance): a speaker addresses himself to an interlocutor in a
dramatic moment that reveals something about the speaker’s psychological state. The
poem consists of 37 lines divided into 4 stanzas. Some scholars have noted connections
to the sonnet form: the first stanza is 14 lines long, and the two following stanzas together
34
Madden, Matthew Arnold: A Study of the Aesthetic Temperament in Victorian England.
make 14 lines; if the content of the last stanza can be read as constituting a break from,
response to, departure from, turn from, or reversal of what comes before, then we can
argue for at least the effect of the sonnet form. Although there are many end rhymes, the
rhyme scheme is irregular, as is the meter. It has been called “the first major ‘free-verse’
poem in the language.”35
Background Notes: “Dover Beach” is Arnold’s best-known poem. The circumstance of
its composition is thought to be Arnold’s visit to Dover soon after his wedding on June
10, 1851. In his biography of Arnold, Park Honan informs us that “[a] manuscript of part
of ‘Dover Beach’ dates from the time of Matthew Arnold’s honeymoon, and his diary
shows that even after he and Fanny Lucy set up housekeeping at Hampstead they planned
a return to the coast. Late in June … they journeyed to a hotel at Dover.”36 Dwight
Culler, in general agreement with several other critics, likewise writes that “[v]ery little is
known certainly about the date or occasion of ‘Dover Beach’ … it was first published in
1867 … [but] was probably written much earlier, perhaps in June, 1851, when Arnold
passed through Dover on his wedding journey to the Continent.”37 Hence, the speaker of
the poem is generally considered to be Matthew Arnold who addresses himself,
presumably, to his new bride.
Arnold’s grief over his father’s death (1842) and his crisis of faith throughout the 1840s
gave way to poetic expressions of profound loss and melancholy. Poems such as “Dover
Beach” and “Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse” resound with echoes of his theological
crisis. The theme of loss of faith is explored here alongside one possible remedy to the
loss: romantic love. (The natural world and poetry serve as two additional consolations
and/or substitutes for religion throughout Arnold’s corpus.) Some critics have read the
last stanza as an affirmation of the power of human love to act as a solace against the pain
of faith’s “melancholy, long, withdrawing roar.”
In The Cultural Theory of Matthew Arnold, Joseph Carroll argues that poems such as
“Dover Beach” and “Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse”
reflect Arnold’s concern that poetry yield some form of resolution, some vent for
distress, or some appeal to elementary passions that transcend the modern
condition and that animate and ennoble the reader…. Arnold hears in the sound of
the waves a reminder of the decline of Christianity.38
Clinton Machann confirms Carroll’s line of argumentation by further informing us that
“Dover Beach”
illustrates how Arnold’s deepest structures of feeling, throughout his literary
career, are grounded in his religious heritage. At the emotional climax of the
poem, the speaker addresses his companion … and … goes on to describe the
35
Stefan Collini, Arnold (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988).
Park Honan, Matthew Arnold: A Life (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1981).
37
Culler, Poetry and Criticism of Matthew Arnold.
38
Joseph Carroll, The Cultural Theory of Matthew Arnold (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982).
36
senseless violence of the world that underlies its seeming beauty. This [“Ah, love,
let us be true/ To one another”] is an echo of 1 John 4:7-10, which reads
‘Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God.’ Arnold’s lines constitute a
profound secularization of the Biblical passage but remind us how his language is
saturated with conscious and unconscious references to the Bible.39
General Themes for Exploration
•
Modern angst
•
The inability to “connect” with others in the modern world
•
Loss of faith
•
Romantic love as solace
•
Uncertainty, instability, fragmentation of human psyche in the face of modernity
and in the face of religious doubt
•
The sea (as symbol)
•
Historical flux—past, present, future, and their effect upon each other—and the
human condition
Lines of Inquiry and Discussion Questions
1.
39
Critics have written variously and with considerable disagreement on the topic of
love as a potentially salvific force in “Dover Beach.” A few germane examples are
here given. In “Arnold the Poet” William Madden asserts that the speaker of
“Dover Beach” entreats his beloved to remain faithful to him, “for loving fidelity
… [is] the one stay of humanity in a world which seems beautiful, but in reality has
‘neither love, nor joy, nor light…’.” Madden calls this kind of love “existential”
and defines it as “the love of those who have shed romantic illusions in favour of a
more realistic, more resigned companionship of mutually pledged fidelity in an
infected world.”40 Lionel Trilling, in his 1955 biography, agrees with Madden,
claiming that Arnold believed “fidelity … is a word relevant only to those lovers
who see the world as a place of sorrow and in their common suffering require the
comfort of constancy; the theme is taken up in ‘Dover Beach’.”41 Fraser Neiman
goes further, extending the emotion of love to a more generalized emotion he terms
“sympathy”: “[A]ll readers of Arnold will remember that the possibility of the rare
actuality of full emotional sympathy affords the sole point of stability in the
insecure world of ‘Dover Beach’.”42 And Stuart Sherman paints a haunting picture
with his particular depiction of the “spiritual isolation” that marks the mood of the
poem: “This is the major mood of ‘Dover Beach,’ in which … there blends the
pathos of the merely human affections of lovers clinging to each other like children
lost in the night.”43 But others disagree. Kenneth and Miriam Allott argue that love
does “nothing to alleviate the conception of a pitiless law governing the lonely
Machann, Matthew Arnold: A Literary Life.
William Madden, “Arnold the Poet: Lyric and Elegiac Poems” in Writers and their Background:
Matthew Arnold (Columbus: Ohio University Press, 1976).
41
Lionel Trilling, Matthew Arnold (New York: Meridian Books, 1955).
42
Neiman, Matthew Arnold.
43
Sherman, Matthew Arnold: How to Know Him.
40
existences of men.”44 Edward Alexander reaffirms the Allotts’ view in his study
about the modern temper, writing: “[Arnold] knows that the hope of finding truth in
personal relations, in ‘love,’ must be vain in a world that destroys the very
conditions that could endow love with meaning.”45
What is your opinion of Arnold’s conception of love as it is presented in “Dover
Beach”? How would you characterize Arnold’s (or the speaker’s) vision about love
in the modern world? His plea is for constancy; he exhorts his beloved to remain
faithful: “Ah, love, let us be true/ To one another.” But he asks for fidelity in love
in a world he explicitly claims “hath … [no] love.” Is this a dubious entreaty? Does
the speaker, in fact, possibly see the contemporary world as a place where
“connecting” with another has become impossible? (In this capacity, Arnold’s
poem anticipates T. S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”—the
quintessential poetic expression of the inability to connect in the modern world.) Is
the speaker contradicting himself in his “confused alarms of struggle and flight,” or
is love—romantic love—meant to stand apart from and above a world without
love? (The same theme appears in “To Marguerite—Continued.”)
2.
Feelings of estrangement, alienation, fragmentation, and loneliness—feelings we
often associate with the modern condition—were experienced widely among
Victorians, from all accounts. Epistemological changes and the barrage of
information to which Victorians were exposed in an alarmingly short period of time
resulted in varied opinions among family members and the closest of friends.
People felt divided from one another, uncertain of their own opinions and of the
loyalties of others. The frequent companion to this sense of social alienation was a
sense of cosmic isolation in a world that had lost the certainty and comfort of a
benevolent God. Associated feelings included fear, instability, vulnerability,
confusion, and a sense of meaninglessness. Arnold’s “Dover Beach” is one of
several poems in his corpus that touch upon this theme of existential loneliness.
Warren Anderson in “Arnold and the Classics” writes: “With the possible
exception of The Waste Land, no other poem of the nineteenth or even the
twentieth century captures the isolation of modern humanity as does ‘Dover
Beach’, with its use of the Thucydidean night battle.”46 The last three lines, in
particular—lines that Dwight Culler calls “the central statement which Arnold
makes about the human condition”47—capture this sense of confusion and
isolation:
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.
44
Allott and Allott, “Arnold the Poet: Narrative and Dramatic Poems.”
Edward Alexander, Matthew Arnold, John Ruskin, and the Modern Temper (Columbus: Ohio State
University Press, 1973).
46
Warren Anderson, “Arnold and the Classics,” in Writers and their Background: Matthew Arnold
(Columbus: Ohio University Press, 1976).
47
Dwight Culler, Imaginative Reason: The Poetry of Matthew Arnold (New Haven: Yale University Press,
1966).
45
The image of the battle—here a spiritual/psychological one—is derived, we are told
by several critics,
from Thucydides’ famous account of the battle of Epipolae … between the
Athenians and the Syracusans. In that battle, fought on a moonlit plain at the
top of a cliff, the adversaries ‘saw one another [in Thomas Arnold’s
rendering] as men naturally would by moonlight; that is, to see before them
the form of the object but to mistrust their knowing who was friend and who
was foe’.48
Culler continues with his note: “There is some evidence that the night-battle was a
common symbol among Rugby and Oxford men for the spiritual conflict of the
age.”
How does the poem, from start to finish, illustrate the spiritual/psychological
“struggle and flight” that epitomize the Victorian state of mind with regard to
ontological issues? There is evidence throughout the poem of confusion, discord,
and disharmony that comes to a head in the last three lines. What picture does
Arnold paint of the Victorian psyche? How does he achieve this result? What
elements in the poem point to such confusion and/or discord? (You might focus
especially on Arnold’s representation of sensory stimuli and the speaker’s
concomitant responses to these.)
Connections and Discussion Questions
1.
“Dover Beach” has been compared with “Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse” in
several ways. Arnold’s honeymoon journey took him to both Dover and the Grande
Chartreuse monastery. What connections can be drawn between the two poems in
their content and tone? What differences do you find, if any, between one speaker’s
expression of loss of faith and the other’s? How is theological crisis expressed in
each poem? How, for example, do the respective landscapes of each poem function
to manifest the sense of loss, grief, and uncertainty that result from having “lost”
God? Both poems share a similar tone—not just of melancholy, but also of
Romanticism. How is Romanticism evinced in each poem; how, similarly; how,
differently? Characterize the picture of the modern world that Arnold conveys in
both poems. What does the contemporary (and future) world promise to humanity,
especially as this promise is held up to the past?
2.
A comparative reading of “Dover Beach” with “The Forsaken Merman,” “The
Buried Life,” “Isolation. To Marguerite,” and “To Marguerite—Continued” that
takes up the theme of romantic love might prove quite fruitful. Predominant in all
but one of the poems listed (“Isolation. To Marguerite”) is water imagery. In “The
Forsaken Merman,” the sea represents domesticity and the potential for romantic
bliss and individual freedom, as much as it acts as divisive agent between the
48
Culler, Poetry and Criticism of Matthew Arnold.
Merman and Margaret. The desertion of the sea is tantamount to God’s desertion of
humankind, in the mind of the speaker in “Dover Beach.” The sea in “To
Marguerite—Continued” is a symbol of life—possibly of modern life—that
functions, once more, to divide individuals by virtue of a “severance” for which the
speaker holds God responsible. The river symbolizes one’s “inmost soul” in “The
Buried Life.” Explore the possible connections offered up by Arnold’s repeatedly
occurring images and symbols.
3.
Two sections of the website component of the Broadview Anthology of British
Literature are particularly relevant points of comparison: the “Religion and
Society” contexts section and the selection of Arthur Hugh Clough’s work.
4.
See Anthony Hecht’s parody “The Dover Bitch: A Criticism of Life” below for a
comparative reading. Reading these two poems side-by-side may lead to interesting
discussions about the genre of parody, modern responses to Victorian poems, point
of view, and so on.
“The Dover Bitch: A Criticism of Life”
by Anthony Hecht
So there stood Matthew Arnold and this girl
With the cliffs of England crumbling away behind them,
And he said to her, “Try to be true to me,
And I'll do the same for you, for things are bad
All over, etc., etc.”
Well now, I knew this girl. It’s true she had read
Sophocles in a fairly good translation
And caught that bitter allusion to the sea,
But all the time he was talking she had in mind
The notion of what his whiskers would feel like
On the back of her neck. She told me later on
That after a while she got to looking out
At the lights across the channel, and really felt sad,
Thinking of all the wine and enormous beds
And blandishments in French and the perfumes.
And then she got really angry. To have been brought
All the way down from London, and then be addressed
As a sort of mournful cosmic last resort
Is really tough on a girl, and she was pretty.
Anyway, she watched him pace the room
And finger his watch-chain and seem to sweat a bit,
And then she said one or two unprintable things.
But you mustn’t judge her by that. What I mean to say is,
She’s really all right. I still see her once in a while
And she always treats me right. We have a drink
And I give her a good time, and perhaps it’s a year
Before I see her again, but there she is,
Running to fat, but dependable as they come.
And sometimes I bring her a bottle of Nuit d’Amour.49
To what extend does this poem present a telling satire of Victorian attitudes? Of
Arnold’s speaker? Of the speaker’s interlocutor? In the end, the poem’s satire
seems to be directed most of all at the young woman, portraying her (after the
fashion of male modernist poets such as Eliot and Pound) as fundamentally
shallow, mired in the prosaic and quotidian. Does Hecht’s parody in the end say
more about the twentieth century (and misogyny) than about Victorian attitudes?
“East London” and “West London”
•
•
Date of composition unknown; probably 1863 for both poems.
First published in 1867 and reprinted many times thereafter.
Form: “East London” and “West London” are companion sonnets. Each is divided into
an octave and then a sestet; Arnold further divides the octave into two quatrains and the
sestet into two tercets in each poem. The first eight lines advance a problem or present a
situation, and the next six resolve or respond to the issue presented in the first eight. The
rhyme scheme of both poems also remains loyal to the conventions of the Italian
(Petrarchan) sonnet: “East London” rhymes abba abba cdc ede; “West London” rhymes
abba abba cde dec. The abba abba rhyme scheme in the octave and the varied rhyme in
the sestet are conventional to the Italian sonnet. Both sonnets are in iambic pentameter.
Background Notes: The occasion for the poem (“East London”) points to Arnold’s
deeply philanthropic sympathies and his spirit of social reform. Edward Alexander
supplies us with this bit of history:
In 1863, while inspecting schools in the East End of London … Arnold met a sick
and overworked preacher whose ability to sustain his cheerfulness in the midst of
the squalor by his religious faith reinforced Arnold’s conviction that spiritual
detachment was the key to vision as well as to peace.50
In their Commentary Tinker and Lowry inform us that “[t]he ‘preacher’ whom Arnold
met [referred to in ‘East London’] was the Reverend William Tyler … pastor of the
Congregational Church in … Spitalfields.”51 Arnold was moved by the preacher’s
cheerfulness and charity, despite the difficult circumstances of his duties. The same
theme appears in “West London”; a beggar who refuses alms from “the rich [whom] she
… let pass with frozen stare” calls to Arnold’s mind the triumphant human spirit that
seeks to rise above its current circumstances. Patrick McCarthy cites these two sonnets in
reminding us that “[i]n the midst of … misery Arnold found examples of virtue and
spirit: the clergyman William Tyler cheered by thoughts of Christ as he went about his
49
Citation for Anthony Hecht here.
Alexander, Matthew Arnold, John Ruskin, and the Modern Temper.
51
Tinker and Lowry, eds., The Poetry of Matthew Arnold: A Commentary.
50
work, the ragged woman in the West End begging only from workers and scorning to ask
from rich passers-by.”52
General Themes for Exploration
•
Christian humanitarianism
•
City life in an industrial society
•
The human spirit in the face of adversity
•
Social conditions in Victorian England
Connections and Discussion Questions
1.
Arnold’s two sonnets (“West London,” in particular) touch on the subject of urban
poverty and misery. It may be interesting to compare his depiction with that of
Blake in his poem “London.” Another interesting point of comparison may be
Wordsworth’s “London, 1802,” which pays tribute to the spirit of (English)
greatness, as does Arnold’s “East London.” A comparative reading might be
fruitful, especially given the fact that Arnold was much influenced by
Wordsworth’s work and thought. (It may be of some interest to know that the
Italian sonnet verse form was used in English mostly by Milton and
Wordsworth—a fact that could not have escaped Arnold’s notice.)
2.
What points of connection can you find between the content of the two sonnets and
that of the excerpt from the “Sweetness and Light” chapter of Culture and Anarchy
provided in the anthology?
“Preface to the First Edition of Poems”
Consult the “Contexts: Religion and Society” section in the website component of the
Broadview Anthology of British Literature to supplement the reading of Arnold’s prose.
Summary and Analysis: In the Preface to his 1853 volume of poetry entitled Poems,
Arnold uses the occasion of his omission of “Empedocles on Aetna” from that volume to
comment on the era in which he is writing—what he calls the “modern” age. The
explanation he provides for excluding “Empedocles” is tied in with his poetic theory,
which has an Aristotelian cast.
He tells his readers that “Empedocles” was omitted from the volume because it fell short
of delivering what great poetry should achieve: poetical representation, he writes, “not
only … shall interest, but also … it shall inspirit and rejoice the reader … convey a
charm, and infuse delight.” “Empedocles,” instead, was a poem, in Arnold’s estimation,
of the order of poems “in which suffering finds no vent in action; in which a continuous
state of mental distress is prolonged, unrelieved by incident, hope, or resistance.” The
hyperconsciousness we frequently associate with modernity had already set in during the
52
Patrick J. McCarthy, Matthew Arnold and the Three Classes (New York: Columbia University Press,
1964).
Victorian period, in Arnold’s view; he articulates it here in one of his most famous, most
frequently quoted passages: “the dialogue of the mind with itself has commenced;
modern problems have presented themselves; we hear already the doubts, we witness the
discouragement, of Hamlet and Faust.” He presents us with a picture of the human mind
turned so far inward that disconnection and alienation from the outside world are the
inevitable results. In Arnold’s opinion, the tragedy depicted in his “Empedocles” does not
find “vent in action”; the poetry there does nothing more than represent pain and
suffering. If poetry cannot go beyond a representation of suffering to provide solace and
inspire the reader, then, Arnold says, it is morbid and should not be entertained. (Finding
his own poetry too melancholy, too much given over to this kind of “morbidity,” Arnold
more or less put an end to his poetic career and turned, instead, to prose.)
In the Preface he writes of a poet’s proper place in society, of the proper subjects of
poetry, of their proper representation, of the poet’s relationship with the poetic past
(tradition), and of the past itself as poetic subject. He asserts that “human actions”
comprise the “eternal objects of poetry,” and that the best actions are those that appeal to
our human passions and transcend both culture and time (are permanent and timeless).
Arnold’s admiration of Greek poets and of the Greek aesthetic and Hellenic spirit and
tradition, more generally, come to the surface in the Preface. For Arnold, the Ancient
Greek poets serve as exemplary models because they chose appropriate human actions as
subject matter for their poetry; they maintained harmony among poetic form, subject, and
expression, hence keeping the proper balance between parts and whole; they recognized
the “essentials” of human nature and human action; they did not confine their poetic
object to considerations of time and place, but endeavored instead to cast a more
universal net. He lists against the accomplishments of the Hellenic poets the tendencies
and habits of contemporary (“modern”) English poets and finds the latter deeply wanting.
Here is Arnold erecting standards, incessantly compelling his reader toward the potential
for human perfectibility, as he does in much of his prose.
Key Passages
On the “modern” mind and its hyperconscious, morbidly self-reflexive activity:
“[T]he calm, the cheerfulness, the disinterested objectivity have disappeared; the
dialogue of the mind with itself has commenced; modern problems have
presented themselves; we hear already the doubts, we witness the discouragement,
of Hamlet and of Faust.”
On poetry that does not “add to our knowledge,” and that does not delight—does not
occasion joy or solace:
“What is not interesting, is that which does not add to our knowledge of any kind;
that which is vaguely conceived and loosely drawn; a representation which is
general, indeterminate, and faint, instead of being particular, precise, and firm….
[I]f the representation be a poetical one … [i]t is demanded, not only that it shall
interest, but also that it shall inspirit and rejoice the reader: that it shall convey a
charm, and infuse delight…. [I]t is not enough that a poet should add to the
knowledge of men, it is required of him also that he should add to their
happiness…. What then are the situations, from the representation of which,
though accurate, no poetical enjoyment can be derived? They are those in which
the suffering finds no event in action; in which a continuous state of mental
distress is prolonged, unrelieved by incident, hope, or resistance; in which there is
everything to be endured, nothing to be done.”
On the proper subject matter of great poetry:
“What are the eternal objects of poetry, among all nations and at all times? They
are actions; human actions; possessing an inherent interest in themselves, and
which are to be communicated in an interesting manner by the art of the poet.”
On the differences between the poetry of the Ancient Greeks and that of the Victorians
(Arnold’s emphasis being on the value of parts being subordinated to the whole, and on
content being privileged above expression):
“[W]ith them, the poetical character of the action in itself, and the conduct of it,
was the first consideration; with us, attention is fixed mainly on the value of the
separate thoughts and images which occur in the treatment of an action. They
regarded the whole; we regard the parts. With them, the action predominated over
the expression of it; with us, the expression predominates over the action.”
On the importance of rising above one’s present moment (here in poetry, but by
implication extending to all human conduct), in the interest of aspiring to a higher, more
permanent standard of moral living for humankind, generally:
“As he penetrates into the spirit of the great classical works, as he becomes
gradually aware of their intense significance, their noble simplicity, and their
calm pathos, he will be convinced that it is this effect, unity and profoundness of
moral impression, at which the ancient poets aimed; that it is this which
constitutes the grandeur of their works, and which makes them immortal….
Above all, he will deliver himself from the jargon of modern criticism, and escape
the danger of producing poetical works conceived in the spirit of the passing time,
and which partake of its transitoriness.”
Questions for Consideration
1.
What is the poet’s function, according to Arnold? What must he be able to achieve
for his readers? What does this convey about Victorian anxieties and the
concomitant expectations of Victorian intellectuals? What is Arnold’s opinion as to
appropriate subjects of poetry? How should the contemporary poet treat the past as
poetic subject?
2.
Arnold refers to tragedy and says it can be enjoyable: “In presence of the most
tragic circumstances, represented in a work of Art, the feeling of enjoyment … may
still subsist: the representation of the most utter calamity, of the liveliest anguish, is
not sufficient to destroy it.” How so? What does he mean? What, then, does not
occasion joy or provide enjoyment in poetry? What kind of poetry is Arnold
contrasting to the sort of tragedy from which enjoyment can be derived so readily?
3.
Arnold says that “poetical works belong to the domain of our permanent actions.”
What does he mean by this statement? How do the past and the present (as both
historical and poetic moments) figure into this poetic theory, according to Arnold?
4.
In explaining the transcendent quality of great poetry, Arnold makes a distinction
between “externals” (details of time and place) and “essentials” (facts of human
nature). What does he mean to indicate about poetry by drawing this dichotomy?
5.
What is Arnold’s general opinion of the poetry of his age? Find passages in the text
that point specifically to his opinion.
6.
Arnold’s characterization of the Ancient Greek poets reveals his deep admiration
for their work—work he holds up against that of his contemporary moment and by
virtue of which he finds the latter lacking. List the accomplishments of Greek
poetry Arnold cites as desirable.
7.
Arnold cites Shakespeare as a model for contemporary English poets to emulate.
He warns, however, of a possible danger: “his works, excellent and fruitful for the
readers of poetry, for the great majority, have been of unmixed advantage to the
writers of it.” What, precisely, is Arnold’s objection to Shakespeare as a model for
the poets of Victorian England?
8.
What, if anything, do you find problematic in Arnold’s poetic theory as it is given,
in part, in the Preface? With which portions do you disagree, and why?
Excerpt from “The Function of Criticism at the Present Time”
Summary and Analysis: “The Function of Criticism at the Present Time” serves, for all
intents and purposes, as a statement of definition and defense for literary criticism.
Arnold poses and answers the questions: what is literary criticism, and why should it be
practiced? Recognizing his approach as a departure from what was commonly regarded
as criticism by his contemporaries, he insists upon it, anyway (“I am bound by my own
definition of criticism”): “a disinterested endeavour to learn and propagate the best that is
known and thought in the world.” Given Arnold’s view that criticism should extend not
only to literature but also to life, some of his cultural theory also comes across in the text.
The piece opens with an objection to the politically- and practically-motivated criticism
of Arnold’s day, and against it he proposes a disinterested play of mind: a criticism that
remains “pure” because it keeps above the agenda-driven concerns of current criticism by
“keeping aloof from what is called ‘the practical view of things’.” Here is Arnold raising
his voice against “Philistines” (the middle class) and what he considers their tendencies
of partisanship, materialism, utilitarianism, insularity, and complacent self-satisfaction.
His liberal humanism is at work in inciting his readers to rise to their best selves—to
work toward a greater breadth of knowledge and understanding of the world, to widen
their perspectives, to turn an objective eye inward toward self-reflection and selfexamination as a nation.
Admitting that “the critical faculty is lower than the inventive,” he nonetheless sets out to
tell his readers about the indispensability of criticism to epochs of literature. Why
practice literary criticism? First, because it is, in fact, creative; creativity is “the highest
function of man; it is proved to be so by man’s finding in it his true happiness.”
Creativity is not, however, limited to “producing great works of literature or art”;
otherwise, only a very few could achieve happiness in life. Hence, criticism becomes, in
Arnold’s view, one means of exercising the creative faculty without having to “invent,”
as it were. Second, and more convincingly, Arnold argues that the Victorian period (a
period he considered “unpoetical”) does not provide proper material for creativity—for
artistic invention. Criticism can prove a sort of remedy to this dilemma experienced by
particular literary epochs by inspiring an otherwise sterile period with new life—with
new standards and new ideas that feed the creative spirit.
The essay also presents some of Arnold’s theory of criticism. In his characteristically
eloquent prose that demonstrates not only his highly developed rhetorical talent but also
his sharp wit and humor, Arnold exercises his skill as literary critic in his
pronouncements about Romantic literature, and his skill as cultural critic against the
small-mindedness of middle-class society—against the day’s politics and its journalism
in his famous passage about Wragg.
Key Passages
On “epochs of literature,” on what is required for the production of masterworks of
literature, and of what these consist:
“[C]reative power works with elements, with materials; what if it has not those
materials, those elements, ready for its use? … The grand work of literary genius
is a work of synthesis and exposition, not of analysis and discovery; its gift lies in
the faculty of being happily inspired by a certain intellectual and spiritual
atmosphere, by a certain order of ideas, when it finds itself in them; of dealing
divinely with these ideas, presenting them in the most effective and attractive
combinations—making beautiful works with them, in short…. This is why great
creative epochs in literature are so rare, this is why there is so much that is
unsatisfactory in the productions of many men of real genius; because, for the
creation of a masterwork of literature two powers must concur, the power of the
man and the power of the moment, and the man is not enough without the
moment; the creative power has, for its happy exercise, appointed elements, and
those elements are not in its own control.”
On the Romantic poets and the need for “culture”—for liberal humanism—a wellrounded breadth of mind, grounded in a literary tradition:
“[A] poet … ought to know life and the world before dealing with them in
poetry…. [T]he burst of creative activity in our literature, through the first quarter
of this century, had about it in fact something premature…. And this
prematureness comes from its having proceeded without having its proper date,
without sufficient materials to work with. In other words, the English poetry of
the first quarter of this century, with plenty of energy, plenty of creative force, did
not know enough. This makes Byron so empty of matter, Shelley so incoherent,
Wordsworth even, profound as he is, yet so wanting in completeness and variety.”
On the indispensability of a “free play of mind” for the continued intellectual and
spiritual development of humankind:
“The notion of the free play of the mind upon all subjects being a pleasure in
itself, being an object of desire, being an essential provider of elements without
which a nation’s spirit, whatever compensations it may have for them, must, in
the long run, die of inanition, hardly enters into an Englishman’s thoughts. It is
noticeable that the word curiosity, which in other languages is used in a good
sense, to mean, as a high and fine quality of man’s nature, just this disinterested
love of a free play of mind on all subjects, for its own sake—it is noticeable, I say,
that this word has in our language no sense of the kind, no sense but a rather bad
and disparaging one. But criticism, real criticism, is essentially the exercise of this
very quality.”
On disinterestedness as the rule for criticism:
“The rule may be summed up in one word—disinterestedness. And how is
criticism to show disinterestedness? By keeping aloof from what is called ‘the
practical view of things’; by resolutely following the law of its own nature, which
is to be a free play of mind on all subjects which it touches. By steadily refusing
to lend itself to any of those ulterior, political, practical considerations about
ideas…. [Criticism’s] business is … simply to know the best that is known and
thought in the world, and by in its turn making this known, to create a current of
true and fresh ideas.”
[One pedagogical consideration here is that many students may confuse “disinterested”
with “uninterested”; it is worth spending a minute or two to be sure they understand the
difference.]
Questions for Consideration
1.
Arnold preached objectivity with his theory of “disinterestedness,” but many have
since argued that Arnold himself was not disinterested. What might a critic today
say to Arnold’s notion of dividing politics from art? Can we, indeed, divide what
we do from why we do it? Doesn’t Arnold’s own program promote a certain
agenda? Does it not follow its own line of “politics”? Or can Arnold’s ideas about
disinterestedness and “purity” in art still stand, regardless of his own set of biases?
2.
Arnold asserts that there are epochs of literature, some richer than others. He writes
that “in the Greece of Pindar and Sophocles, in the England of Shakespeare, the
poet lived in a current of ideas in the highest degree animating and nourishing to
the creative power; society was, in the fullest measure, permeated by fresh thought,
intelligent and alive.” Do you agree with his notion of “epochs of literature”? Are
there, in fact, periods during which society is “permeated by fresh thought,
intelligent and alive” such that the milieu inspires artistic creation, and periods
during which it is not? What is the relationship of society/culture to the works of art
produced by it?
3.
Holding objectivity—disinterestedness—as a defining mark of a person who is
self-reflective and just, Arnold writes that “whoever sets himself to see things as
they are will find himself one of a very small circle; but it is only by this small
circle resolutely doing its own work that adequate ideas will ever get current at all.”
Discuss what Arnold means, exactly, by seeing “the object as in itself it really is,”
and why he believes few can achieve such disinterestedness. Do you agree with his
assessment? Why or why not? Is the picture he paints of a “proper” critic—a “man
of letters”—a desirable one?
4.
The passages leading to the mention of a young workhouse girl named “Wragg,”
the passage itself, and the passages immediately following it are among the most
famous in Arnold’s prose. Not only is Arnold demonstrating here his brilliance at
rhetorical play, he is also exemplifying the significance of cultural criticism and
making a very important point about English society. Read the passages carefully
and discuss what is at stake and what Arnold is doing (both rhetorically and
ethically).
5.
It is notable that in taking issue with the view that “our old Anglo-Saxon breed” is
“the best in the world,” Arnold fixes first of all on the alleged “grossness” of this
name “wragg,” which he sees as reflecting a “shortcoming in the more delicate
spiritual perceptions.” It is only later in the paragraph that he brings in other aspects
of English society that are far from “the best in the word”—“the gloom, the smoke,
the cold, the strangled illegitimate child.” To the twenty-first-century reader it may
be disturbing that Arnold seems more engaged by the aesthetics involved than he
does by any human concern for the victims of the ills of Victorian society—victims
such as the illegitimate child and its mother. In this context you might wish to ask
students to make a case against the sort of disinterestness that Arnold rates so
highly.
6.
Arnold argues that “the critic must keep out of the region of immediate practice in
the political, social, humanitarian sphere, if he wants to make a beginning for that
free speculative treatment of things….” What is Arnold really recommending here
for the critic, and why?
7.
The essay provides some criteria—a basic definition and some standards—of what,
in Arnold’s estimation, constitutes (literary) criticism. Trace the main points of his
argument, and establish the tenets of Arnold’s theory of criticism.
Excerpt from Culture and Anarchy, Chapter 1: “Sweetness and Light”
Background: Culture and Anarchy was first published in 1869. In the Preface to the
book, Arnold states his intention:
The whole scope of the essay is to recommend culture as the great help out of our
present difficulties; culture being a pursuit of our total perfection by means of
getting to know, on all the matters which most concern us, the best which has
been thought and said in the world, and, through this knowledge, turning a stream
of fresh and free thought upon our stock notions and habits, which we now follow
staunchly but mechanically, vainly imagining that there is a virtue in following
them staunchly which makes up for the mischief of following them mechanically.
In his study, Matthew Arnold and the Three Classes, Patrick J. McCarthy provides a
useful summary of Arnold’s main line of argument:
In his greatest prose work, Culture and Anarchy, Matthew Arnold examines each
of what he considers the three classes of England to determine its fitness as a
center of authority and source of light. Each class in turn is found wanting, and
Arnold then suggests that the nation rise above the notion of classes to the
conception of a state. The state, as the corporate and collective ‘best self’ of
England, would have the power to restrain the excesses of each class and the
intelligence to direct the strength of each class toward the proper modes of
‘expansion,’ that is, liberty.53
Summary and Analysis: As the two preceding pieces, “The Preface” and “The Function
of Criticism at the Present Time,” treat the subjects of poetry and criticism, respectively,
the excerpt from the “Sweetness and Light” chapter of Culture and Anarchy deals with
Arnold’s idea of culture. The piece serves well to expand the reader’s understanding of
Arnold’s liberal humanism as it also introduces the reader to his ethical idealism.
Arnold’s approach in the excerpt provided is to juxtapose culture to organized religion as
two modes of the pursuit of human perfection. He recalls the notion of disinterestedness
with its ancillary notion of curiosity (“a liberal and intelligent eagerness about the things
of the mind”) introduced in “The Function of Criticism at the Present Time,” and at first
establishes these as the collective “motive” for seeking and developing culture.
Appending to disinterestedness the even nobler endeavor of ethics—of “leav[ing] the
world better and happier than we found it”—Arnold completes and offers up a definition
of culture: “Culture is then properly described not as having its origin in curiosity, but as
having its origin in the love of perfection; it is a study of perfection. It moves by the
force, not merely or primarily of the scientific passion for pure knowledge, but also of the
moral and social passion for doing good.”
53
McCarthy, Matthew Arnold and the Three Classes.
While Arnold applauds the English race for its effort toward spiritual perfection (“[n]o
people in the world have done more and struggled more to attain this relative moral
perfection than our English race”) by way of religion, he also finds organized religion a
poor vehicle for the facilitation of human perfection. Arnold finds the idea of human
perfection as conceived by organized religion (Protestantism, in particular) “narrow and
inadequate.” The excerpt also functions to establish Arnold’s strong distaste for
Puritanism and, more generally, for orthodox Christianity.
Key Passage
On culture, organized religion, the English race, the pursuit of perfection, and their
relationship, as a fitting summary of the excerpt:
“[T]he strongest plea for the study of perfection as pursued by culture, the clearest
proof of the actual inadequacy of the idea of perfection held by the religious
organisations—expressing, as I have said, the most widespread effort which the
human race has yet made after perfection—is to be found in the state of our life
and society with these in possession of it, and having been in possession of it I
know not how many hundred years.”
Questions for Consideration
1.
In referring to the conventional Englishman’s conception of curiosity, Arnold
writes: “A liberal and intelligent eagerness about the things of the mind may be
meant by a foreigner when he speaks of curiosity, but with us the word always
conveys a certain notion of frivolous and unedifying activity.” He is here objecting
to particular tendencies in the English habit of mind. Work from the quote to
determine to what, exactly, Arnold seems to object.
2.
Although Arnold attacks organized religion as being “narrow and inadequate,” he
does find one particular accomplishment of religion laudatory. What is that
accomplishment, specifically?
3.
Arnold refers to “the subduing of the obvious faults of our animality” and to “selfconquest.” What is his meaning? What is the relationship of this subduing and selfconquest to the pursuit of human perfection?
Suggested Reading
Alexander, Edward. Matthew Arnold, John Ruskin, and the Modern Temper. Columbus:
Ohio State University Press, 1973.
Allott, Kenneth and Miriam Allott, eds. Writers and Their Background. Columbus: Ohio
University Press, 1976.
Allott, Miriam. “Arnold and ‘Marguerite’ Continued.” Victorian Poetry 23.2 (1985): 12543.
Bell, Bill. “The Function of Arnold at the Present Time.” Essays in Criticism: A
Quarterly Journal of Literary Criticism 47.3 (1997): 203-19.
Blair, Kirstie. Victorian Poetry and the Culture of the Heart. New York: Oxford
University Press, 2006.
Bush, Douglas. Matthew Arnold: A Survey of His Poetry and Prose. New York:
Macmillan, 1971.
Carroll, Joseph. The Cultural Theory of Matthew Arnold. Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1982.
Collini, Stefan. Arnold. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988.
Culler, Dwight. Imaginative Reason: The Poetry of Matthew Arnold. New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1966.
——. Poetry and Criticism of Matthew Arnold. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1961.
De Graef, Ortwin. “Grave Livers: On the Modern Element in Wordsworth, Arnold, and
Warner.” ELH 74:1 (2007): 145-69.
DeLaura, David, ed. Matthew Arnold: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs,
NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1973.
Fabb, Nigel. “The Metres of ‘Dover Beach’.” Language and Literature: Journal of the
Poetics and Linguistics Association 11.2 (2002): 99-117.
Farrell, John P. “‘The Scholar-Gipsy’ and the Continuous Life of Victorian Poetry.”
Victorian Poetry 43.3 (2005): 277-96.
Giordano, Frank R., Jr. “In Defense of Margaret: Another Look at Arnold’s ‘The
Forsaken Merman’.” Victorian Newsletter 54 (1978): 23-28.
Harris, Wendell. “The Lure of Biography: Who Was Marguerite and to Whom Does It
Matter?” Victorian Newsletter 76 (1989): 28-31.
Harrison, Antony H. Victorian Poets and the Politics of Culture: Discourse and Ideology.
Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1998.
Holloway, John. The Victorian Sage: Studies in Argument. London: Macmillan Press,
1953.
Honan, Park. “The Character of Marguerite in Arnold's Switzerland.” Victorian Poetry,
23.2 (1985), 145-59.
——. Matthew Arnold: A Life. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1981.
Kim, Jae Oh. “Arnold’s Thinking: Democracy, Criticism, and Culture.” Nineteenth
Century Literature in English 10.2 (2006): 59-83.
Leerssen, Joep. “Englishness, Ethnicity and Matthew Arnold.” European Journal of
English Studies 10.1 (2006): 63-79.
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——. Matthew Arnold: A Literary Life. New York: St. Martin's, 1998.
Madden, William. Matthew Arnold: A Study of the Aesthetic Temperament in Victorian
England. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1967.
Marucci, Franco. “Patterns of Intermittence in Arnold’s ‘Dover Beach’.” South Carolina
Review 14.2 (1999): 261-80.
Novak, Robert. “Prufrock and Arnold’s ‘Buried Life’.” Windless Orchard 12 (1973): 2326.
O'Neill, Michael. “‘The Burden of Ourselves’: Arnold as a Post-Romantic Poet.”
Yearbook of English Studies 36.2 (2006): 109-24.
Riede, David G. Matthew Arnold and the Betrayal of Language. Charlottesville:
University Press of Virginia, 1988.
Roper, Alan. Arnold’s Poetic Landscapes. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1969.
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Sherman, Stuart P. Matthew Arnold: How to Know Him. Hamden, CT: Archon Books,
1968.
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London: Oxford University Press, 1940.
Trilling, Lionel. Matthew Arnold. New York: Meridian Books, 1955.
Tucker, Herbert F. “Arnold and the Authorization of Criticism.” Knowing the Past:
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The publisher gratefully acknowledges the assistance of Alina Gharabegian of the City
University of New York for the preparation of the draft material.