Matthew Arnold| Dover Beach

Dover Beach

------Matthew Arnold

The sea is calm to-night,

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.

Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!

Only, from the long line of spray

Where the sea meets the moon-blanch'd land,

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.

Sophocles long ago

Heard it on the Aegean, 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.

The sea of faith

Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore

Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furl'd.

But now I only hear

Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,

Retreating, to the breath

Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear

And naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be true

To one another! for the world which seems

To lie before us like a land of dreams,

So various, so beautiful, so new,

Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,

Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;

And we are here as on a darkling plain

Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,

Where ignorant armies clash by night.

多佛海滩

马修·阿诺德著 长风译

今夜，大海风平浪静，

潮水高涨，明月倾洒在海峡之上；

法兰西对岸的灯光，

忽明忽暗；英格兰的峭壁

耸立在静谧的海湾，沉郁苍茫 ；

窗前的晚风如此清爽！

月光下

漫长的海岸线

却传来低沉的咆哮。

那是浪花在退去中将卵石翻滚，

又涌来将它们推向高滩的声音。

它们周而复始，

缓慢，战栗，

一如永恒的悲调。

古时索弗克斯

曾聆听过爱琴海的波涛，

令他想到

此消彼长人世的苦恼。

而今遥远北海的声音，

也令人感触良多。

永恒的大海曾经浩浩汤汤，

用它洁白的腰带

环绕全球的海岸，

而今我只能听到

它悠长而消沉的悲鸣，

应和着晚风的呜咽，

退缩到悬崖之下

黑暗和裸露的沙滩。

爱人啊，愿我们真诚相待，

因为眼前的世界，

看似梦幻般

多姿多彩，美好新奇，

其实无喜、无爱，无光，

无信、无宁、无助；

我们身处黑暗的荒原，

已被无知军队混战中的

挣扎和逃遁所淹没。

Dover Beach
By Matthew Arnold

1

The sea is calm to-night.
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.
Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
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......................................14

Notes, Stanza 1

moon . . . straits: The water reflects the image of the moon. A strait is a narrow body of water that connects two larger bodies of water. In this poem, straits refers to the Strait of Dover (French: Pas de Calais), which connects the English Channel on the south to the North Sea on the north. The distancebetween the port cities of Dover, England, and Calais, France, is about twenty-one miles via the Strait of Dover.
light . . . gone: This clause establishes a sense of rhythm in that the light blinks on and off. In addition, the clause foreshadows the message of later lines--that the light of faith in God and religion, once strong, now flickers. Whether an observer at Dover can actually see a light at Calais depends on the height of thelighthouse and the altitude at which the observer sees the light (because of the curvature of the earth), on the brightness of the light, and on the weather conditions.
cliffs . . . vast: These are white cliffs, composed of chalk, a limestone that easily erodes. Like the light from France, they glimmer, further developing the theme of a weakening of the light of faith. The fact that they easily erode supports this theme.
moon-blanched: whitened by the light of the moon.
grating . . . .pebbles: Here, grating (meaning rasping, grinding, or scraping) introduces conflict between the sea and the land and, symbolically, between long-held religious beliefs and the challenges against them. However, it may be an exaggeration that that pebbles cause a grating roar.
strand: shoreline

---

2

Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Aegean, 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............................20

Notes, Stanza 1

Sophocles . . . Aegean: Arnold alludes here to a passage in the ancient Greek play Antigone, by Sophocles, in which Sophocles says the gods can visit ruin on people from one generation to the next, like a swelling tide driven by winds.
it: 'the eternal note of sadness' (line 14).
Aegean: The sea between Greece and Turkey. In the time of Sophocles, the land occupied by Turkey was known as Anatolia.
turbid: muddy, cloudy
Find . . . thought: In the sound of the sea, the poet 'hears' a thought that disturbs him as did the one heard by Sophocles.

---

3

The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world..........................;........28

Notes, Stanza 3

Sea . . . full: See theme, above, for an explanation.
girdle: sash, belt; anything that surrounds or encircles
I only hear: I alone hear
shingles: gravel on the beach

Interpretation

There was a time when faith in God was strong and comforting. This faith wrapped itself around us, protecting us from doubt and despair, as the sea wraps itself around the continents and islands of the world. Now, however, the sea of faith has become a sea of doubt. Science challenges the precepts of theology and religion; human misery makes people feel abandoned, lonely. People place their faith in material things.

---

4

Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night......................37

Notes, Stanza 4

neither . . . pain: The world has become a selfish, cynical, amoral, materialistic battlefield; there is much hatred and pain, but there is no guiding light.
darkling: dark, obscure, dim; occurring in darkness; menacing, threatening, dangerous, ominous.
Where . . . night: E.K. Brown and J.O. Bailey suggest that this line is an allusion to Greek historian Thucydides' account of the Battle of Epipolae (413 BC), a walled fortress near the city of Syracuse on the island of Sicily. In that battle, Athenians fought an army of Syracusans at night. In the darkness, the combatants lashed out blindly at one another. Brown and Bailey further observe that the line 'suggests the confusion of mid-Victorian values of all kinds . . . ' (Brown, E.K, and J.O. Bailey, eds. Victorian Poetry. 2nd ed. New York: Ronald Press, 1962, page 831).

Interpretation

Let us at least be true to each other in our marriage, in our moral standards, in the way we thnk; for the world will not be true to us. Although it presents itself to us as a dreamland, it is a sham. It offers nothing to ease our journey through life.

---

Figures of Speech

Arnold uses avariety of figures of speech, including the following examples. (Fordefinitions of the different figures of speech, see the glossary of literary terms:

Alliteration Examples 1: to-night , tide; full, fair (Lines 1-2); gleams, gone; coast, cliff; long line; which thewaves; folds, furled
Assonance: tide, lies;
Paradox andHyperbole: gratingroar of pebbles
Metaphor: which the waves draw back,and fling (comparison of the waves to an intelligent entity thatrejects that which it has captured)
Metaphor: turbid ebb and flow of humanmisery (comparison of human misery to the ebb and flow of the sea)
Metaphor: TheSea of Faith (comparisonof faith to water making up an ocean)
Simile: The Sea of Faith . . . lay likethe folds of a bright girdle furled (use of like to compare the sea toa girdle)
Metaphor: breath of the night-wind (comparisonof the wind to a living thing)
Simile: the world, which seems / Tolie before us like a land of dreams (use of like to compare the worldto a land of dreams)
Anaphora: So various, so beautiful, so new(repetition of so)
Anaphora: nor love, nor light, / Nor certitude, norpeace, nor help for pain (repetition of nor)

---

Time and Place

Matthew Arnold(1822-1888) wrote 'Dover Beach' during or shortly after a visit heand his wife made to the Dover region of southeastern England, thesetting of the poem, in 1851. They had married in June of that year. A draft ofthe first two stanzas of the poem appears on a sheet of paper he usedto write notes for another work, 'Empedocles on Etna,' published in1852. The town of Dover is closer to France than any other port city inEngland. The body of water separating the coastline of the town from the coastof France is the Strait of Dover, north of the English Channel and south of theNorth Sea.

---

Point of View

The poet/persona uses first-, second-, andthird-person point of view in the poem. Generally, the poem presents theobservations of the author/persona in third-person point of view but shifts tosecond person when he addresses his beloved, as in line 6 (Come), line 9(Listen! you), and line 29 (let). Then he shifts to first-personpoint of view when he includes his beloved and the reader asco-observers, as in Line 18 (we), Line 29 (us), Line 31 (us),and line 35 (we). He also uses first-person point of view to declarethat at least one observation is his alone, and not necessarily that of hisco-observers. This instance occurs in line 24: But now I only hear.This line means But now I alone hear.

---

Who Is the Listener? (Line 29)

The personaddressed in the poem—lines 6, 9, and 29—is Matthew Arnold's wife, Frances LucyWightman. However, since the poem expresses a universal message, one may saythat she can be any woman listening to the observations of any man. Arnold andhis wife visited Dover Beach twice in 1851, the year they were married and theyear Arnold was believed to have written 'Dover Beach.' At that timeArnold was inspector of schools in England, a position he held until1886.

---

Theme

Arnold’s centralmessage is this: Challenges to the validity of long-standingtheological and moral precepts have shaken the faith of people in God andreligion. In Arnold’s world of the mid-1800's, the pillar of faithsupporting society was perceived as crumbling under the weight of scientificpostulates, such as the evolutionary theory of English physician Erasmus Darwinand French naturalist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. Consequently, the existence of Godand the whole Christian scheme of things was cast in doubt. Arnold, who wasdeeply religious, lamented the dying of the light of faith, as symbolized bythe light he sees in “Dover Beach” on the coast of France, which gleams onemoment and is gone the next. He remained a believer in God and religion,although he was open to—and advocated—an overhaul of traditional religiousthinking. In God and the Bible, he wrote: 'At the present momenttwo things about the Christian religion must surely be clear to anybody witheyes in his head. One is, that men cannot do without it; the other, that theycannot do with it as it is.'

---

Type of Work

“Dover Beach” isa poem with the mournful tone of an elegy andthe personal intensity of a dramaticmonologue. Because the meter and rhyme vary from line toline, the poem is said to be in free verse--that is, it is unencumbered by thestrictures of traditional versification. However, there is cadence inthe poem, achieved through the following:

Alliteration Examples: to-night, tide; full, fair; gleams, gone; coast, cliff (firststanza)
ParallelStructure Example: Thetide is full, the moon lies fair (first stanza); So various,so beautiful, so new(fourth stanza); Hath really neither joy, norlove, nor light / Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help forpain (fourth stanza)
Rhyming Words Examples: to-night, light;fair, night-air; stand, land; bay, spray; fling, bring; begin, in (first stanza)
Words SuggestingRhythm Examples:draw back, return; Begin, and cease, then begin again (first stanza); turbidebb and flow (second stanza)

---

Year of Publication

Although Matthew Arnold completed 'DoverBeach' in 1851 or 1852, the poem was not published until 1867. It appearedin a collection entitled New Poems, published in London.