Research Paper-British Literature: Mathew Arnold (1822-1888)

Research Paper-British Literature: Mathew Arnold (1822-1888)

Introduction

Mathew Arnold (1822-1888) was a British poet who was a critic in the Victorian era and was born in Laleham, a tiny village in the valley to the Thames. He went to the Rugby School in 1837 where his father was a headteacher and later attended Oxford in 1841. Six years later, Arnold took the post of private secretary to Lord Lansdowne, and his master assisted him in getting employment as Inspector of schools in 1851, a position he worked for thirty-five years. Arnold found his reputation as a critic becoming a public figure in the 1860s. He wrote many poems and literary works that were criticizing the happenings in the world during the Victorian age, insightfully looking at crucial areas of that period, which can be compared to the modern world in a different perspective.

Some of the significant works he did include; “Essays in Criticism”,” Culture and Anarchy”, and “Literature and Dogma”. He retired from inspecting schools in 1886, later dying of heart failure on April 15, 1888. His work stimulated change and inspiration in the world. This article explores Arnold’s work in the “Essays in Criticism”, which talks about the culture of criticism, and develops ways in which he chose this piece of work during that period. It then gives an extensive explanation of the work, providing a clear picture of the functions of criticism in society.

“Essays in Criticism” Mathew Arnold (1865)

Arnold used criticism as an endeavour of learning and propagating the best that is identified and thought of in the world, establishing a modern current of fresh and true ideas. He was fostering a spirit, one that was of an awakened and well-informed intelligence playing upon not literature only, but theology, art, history, sociology, and politics in all scopes so that a person could see the object as in itself it really was. Seeing something in a way it is, not as a thought or imagined. In the criticism, England was lagging behind France and Germany. He argues that the English people were stuck in complacency and backwater of provinciality and many people writing about it suffered from the primary reason for being left behind. English society was classified as barbarians by Arnold due to their inaccessibility to modern ideas.

Scholars found it challenging to understand England. Its people were supposed to know the literature of other states, apart from their own, and be in contact with modern European standards in literacy. The works that Arnold wrote were always applying modern ideas to life, and the letters brought all things present in the nineteenth century. It further has detailed responsiveness of the poet’s criticism of life and the way he valued food for the current spirit. The words he used in writing represented the significant movement of the brain. As humans become conscious of themselves, how the brain is moving, and the literary production that reflects it. The work moves easily from literary subjects to political and current social matters I the community, and the “Essays in Criticism” remains a greater influence on the critics to the present day.

The role of the critics in the essay was identifying and raising literature during that period. Mathew’s role of inculcating intelligence levels in England the same way he compared himself to Ernest Renan, who had searched for teaching morality in France. Seeking the literary criticism was a way Arnold wanted to remain disinterested, indicating that appreciation should be of the object as it is.

Social Criticism

Mathew was led to a typical critique of the spirit of his age, coming from literary criticism. Writing about the middle class of the English population during the Victorian era, using the word philistines as a modern term to explain cultural meaning. In the “Culture and Anarchy,” he explains himself as a liberal and a person who believes in culture. Historian Bellamy Richard describes it as the broadly Gladstonian effort of transforming the Liberal Party in a vehicle od political moralism. He engaged in questions that raised the thoughts of many Victorian liberals on the nature of power and states’ acting role in moral guiding.

Through attacking of the nonconformists, and the arrogance of Philistines middle class who are masters in the present politics, he described these individuals as the real enemy to the light and only believed that English power was solely from its material wealth alone, forgetting what culture carries. He believed that liberal education was important, and that means a closer looking at the culture and have a critical reflection of its meaning. His works are described as a liberal critique of Victorian liberalism by Hugh Stuart Jones. On the other hand, Alan. S. Kahan placed Arnold’s critique of middle-class philistinism, materialism, and the mediocre within the aristocratic liberalism. Little of his ideas failed to reconcile with the conflicting influences that were internally affecting him. Majority of his criticism is based on a convenient parody of what was supposed to be the foundation for his thinking and living.

In criticism essays, Arnold writes what modern critics have to do instead of believing their artistic limitations. The point where sense and dullness meet should be marked and be discreet, not beyond personal depth. Order of nature is stressed, and the value of the old-age people explains the concept that rules can articulate not all good works. The spirit is at distress throughout Arnold’s literary works that he wrote. In the poem, “Doves Beach” he was reacting violently to the spiritual unrest and the lack of meaning for his age. He argued that religion and traditional values were dying out. The same way, modern people in different states across the globe are abandoning their true identity, and are following other cultures and traditions which are not what identifies them. People are concentrating more on Westernization, forgetting the core values that their ancestors lived by, grew with, and followed in the past.

Modern life and science

Many people currently concentrate on materialism, scepticism and agnosticism which are substitutes for the modern way of living. No man is finding comfort in an arid land, as Arnold puts it up. The pain that man experiences does not find help, peace, or light; neither does love or joy exist in the modern world. Everyone is struggling and fighting with unseen forces which destroy them completely throughout their entire life. Contemporary life doe not have any meaning or identity. Darkness has engulfed the world, and everyone is gloomy, feeling like a hopeless traveller in a distant land. The modern world is full of science, but humans are sceptical because their minds have been destroyed by the scientific concepts that keep popping up daily.

According to Arnold, the world has been left barren, dry, diminished faith, and men are becoming more and more materialistic. Therefore, he could not help becoming a poet or sceptical reaction and continues to complain about the religious beliefs of the Victorian age, which vanished a long time ago. Presently, doubt and disbelief have connected to force and push away the wave of faith from the world’s grasp. The present world looks like a coast where pebbles are lying in complete desolation. Another poem “The Scholar Gypsy” gives a clear picture of the atmosphere during the Victorian unrests and spiritual distress that was happening. The people only came and were gone or disappeared into oblivion. There are no fixed ideals for people to pursue, as they are only interested in materialistic things. No one sticks to one thing, and experiments are failing massively, leaving the individuals feeling miserable, weak, and shocked. The spirit loses its vitality and elasticity.

During the Victorian age, people suffered from uncountable distraction, frustrations, despair, and always felt different about the achievement of their quests. The Victorians have no singleness purpose. The same way modern people chase many hares and fail to catch none, Victorians never succeeded in their pursues at that time. Many individuals will start an experiment or project in the modern world, and later abandon it to pursue another one. Then they fail to achieve or complete any of the projects leading to shocks and significant disappointment. Most of them advance one step today but will move two steps backwards tomorrow, failing to know the core meaning of life they are living.

Modern life is a disease eating the current population, the same way Victorians suffered from it.  Everyone is pursuing wealth, forgetting the real-life lying within them. It is resulting from man’s preoccupation with the tiresome world of business away from the spiritual and moral way of living. Arnold advises the Gypsy to stay away from such a restless, unstable, and noisy world. He further explains that materialism does not lead anyone to the truth and spiritualism. He becomes the poet of the hopeless tangle of the age in his entire writings., proclaiming himself as a man who was not satisfied with the Victorian era.