Dover Beach is a poem by Matthew Arnold that is widely considered to be a dramatic monologue. In a dramatic monologue, a speaker addresses a specific audience and reveals their thoughts, feelings, and emotions through their words. The speaker in Dover Beach is addressing his lover, and through his words, he expresses his deep sadness and despair at the state of the world.
The poem begins with a description of the beach at Dover, with the speaker describing the sound of the waves as they come in and go out. The speaker then compares the sound of the waves to the sound of human suffering, saying that "The Sea of Faith / Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore / Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled." In this line, the speaker is expressing his belief that faith, or belief in something greater, used to be more widespread and widely held. However, now it seems to have retreated, leaving people in a state of despair.
As the poem progresses, the speaker becomes more and more despairing, saying that "The world, which seems / To lie before us like a land of dreams, / So various, so beautiful, so new, / Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light, / Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain." Here, the speaker is expressing his belief that the world is not as perfect and wonderful as it seems, but is actually filled with pain and suffering. He also laments the lack of certainties in the world, saying that there is no peace or help for those in pain.
The final lines of the poem are particularly poignant, with the speaker saying "For nowhere now can find them half so sweet / As when they sang of old the world's delight, / To love and be loved by me." Here, the speaker is expressing his own feelings of isolation and despair, as he longs for the love and companionship that he used to have.
Overall, Dover Beach is a powerful and moving dramatic monologue that explores themes of faith, despair, and love. Through the speaker's words, we are able to understand his deep sadness and despair at the state of the world, and the way that he longs for the love and companionship that he used to have.
Dover Beach: Poem, Themes & Matthew Arnold
Finally, the speaker concretizes that he is speaking to his beloved by addressing her as "love": To one another! The tide is full, the moon lies fair Upon the straits; on the French coast the light Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand, Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay. When new alternatives came to replace the Christian doctrine, people started questioning their earlier beliefs. Dover Beach is an extended meditation by Arnold on the status of religion in mid-Victorian society, but his thoughts are fragmented, diffuse, and not altogether coherent. In this world of uncertainties , no one can do anything. The push-pull between faith and hopelessness is evident in the poem's imagery, which cycles between romantic and despondent moods. What is the poet reminded of in the poem Dover Beach? All this set stage for Charles Darwin who wrote about evolution rather than creation. Whereas a drama progresses through conflicts and actions in a monologue, the development occurs through the clash of motives within the speaker.
How is "Dover Beach" by Matthew Arnold a dramatic monologue?
Sophocles long ago Heard it on the Ægean, and it brought Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow Of human misery; we Find also in the sound a thought, Hearing it by this distant northern sea. In contrast to the previous question, what might this image signify? The sea of faith that enveloped the world just like a girdle has receded now. Somerset Maugham short story of the same name. The world looks beautiful but it is deprived of joy, love, hope, certainty and peace. The poet suggests a way to survive in the midst of the soul-killing loss of faith in our world, and that is, to love and remain loyal to each other. He declares that, once, faith gave brightness to the world, but now faith and the world's brightness are fading. The beloved who is present on the scene is asked to listen to the harsh sound of pebbles as they strike against the shore with the retreat of the waves.
Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold
We are made aware of the loss of faith in the modern world, with its ill-effects. The waves rise and fall in a set pattern and produce a slow, trembling kind of music. The objective of masque was to celebrate marriage in high society. The sea, thus, comes to stand for traditional religious belief. This differentiates the dramatic monologue from the. Instead it: Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light, Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain. To this point line 14 , the poem has been essentially straightforward description.
