Dover Beach is a four stanza poem written by Matthew Arnold that starts out with a quiet scene. It begins with the speaker looking out on the moonlit water and listening to the sound of the waves. The author describes that the night air is sweet as he stands on the pebbled shore looking out at the calm sea. However, he says the sound of the waves create a sad noise. The speaker is reminded of a time he was in Greece, and the sound of the waves takes him on a mental journey back there. The second stanza is about this allusion. He imagines if Sophocles heard the same sound as he stood next to the sea. This allusion creates a connection between Sophocles and the speaker. In the third stanza, the speaker drives the ocean as a metaphor to religion. He refers to an earlier time when religion was more important in peoples lives. He says that people used to have faith full and round. The speaker says that people used to have faith, but just as the tide was going down, so is the faith of people. The las
t stanza takes a pretty big shift. The tone becomes even more sad. The speaker brings up the idea that maybe if the world has lost its faith, it can hold onto some of it. However its the world he hears in the crashing waves. The world is nothing but chaos, and there is no joy left. Meaningless wars are taking place, and the speaker realizes he has lost his faith in the world. Though the poem started out peacefully, the poem ends with the speaker losing hope in the world, which has turned to ugliness and chaos. Arnold starts out his poem describing the beautiful sea and surrounding scene. He expresses his uncertainty about nature, and the mood of the poem quickly changes in a negative way. Throughout the rest of the poem, he describes the landscape in a depressing way. In the poem Dover Beach, Matthew Arnold creates a lonely, disheartening tone by making use of imagery, simile, and personification. Using these elements, he portrays a man standing on the beach afraid of what the world has become.