Dover Beach Tone
Dover Beach, Matthew Arnold, “The sea is calm tonight.”(1) The very first line suggests a poem to inspire tranquility in the reader; but, that tranquility is but an illusion: “Listen! You hear the grating roar of pebbles which the waves draw back and fling...”(9-10) Does this feel like the tone of a peaceful poem? The entire piece plays with the reader's senses, never allowing them to get quite comfortable in their conclusion of what the tone is meant to be, as it is ever shifting. Each Stanza further elaborates to what the main point seems to be, an idealized dream versus a harsh reality.
The first stanza organizes the trend the entirety of the work focuses on; the first half giving a relaxed sensation to the reader. However, the moods go on beyond the black and white it first shows: “begin, and cease, and then begin, with tremulous cadence slow, and bring the eternal note of sadness in.”(12-14) It begins excited and soft, then becomes loud and frustrated in nature, finally becoming slowed, repetitous, and dispirited. The volume being no more than a tug-of-war for the emotions invested. It is hinted that the character in the poem is not alone as he shouts out, “come to the window, sweet is the night air!”(6) Before this line, he describes the enviroment as, “Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.”(5). After he has company, it seems as if he is disenchanted with the scene, seeing the violence and sadness in it instead of the …show more content…
He tells on how the famous tragedy write of the Oedipus series was inspired by the scene in the same way he was. He said the scene, “brought into his mind the turbid ebb and flow of human misery.”(17-18) He says, even across the ocean and time itself, the abyssal image of humanity withstood a hold on them both. He claims Sophocles heard the “eternal note of sadness” long ago as he stood on the Aegean, and so this depressive note reaches to them
The first stanza organizes the trend the entirety of the work focuses on; the first half giving a relaxed sensation to the reader. However, the moods go on beyond the black and white it first shows: “begin, and cease, and then begin, with tremulous cadence slow, and bring the eternal note of sadness in.”(12-14) It begins excited and soft, then becomes loud and frustrated in nature, finally becoming slowed, repetitous, and dispirited. The volume being no more than a tug-of-war for the emotions invested. It is hinted that the character in the poem is not alone as he shouts out, “come to the window, sweet is the night air!”(6) Before this line, he describes the enviroment as, “Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.”(5). After he has company, it seems as if he is disenchanted with the scene, seeing the violence and sadness in it instead of the …show more content…
He tells on how the famous tragedy write of the Oedipus series was inspired by the scene in the same way he was. He said the scene, “brought into his mind the turbid ebb and flow of human misery.”(17-18) He says, even across the ocean and time itself, the abyssal image of humanity withstood a hold on them both. He claims Sophocles heard the “eternal note of sadness” long ago as he stood on the Aegean, and so this depressive note reaches to them