Culture In Matthew Arnold’s Poems

Culture and Anarchy, one of the most celebrated works of Matthew Arnold,systematically presents his theory of culture. With the belief that his literary worksand his theory of culture are inter-related，Arnold’s theory of culture is brieflyintroduced in this thesis, and five pieces of Arnold’s poems are selected forclose-reading. The Forsaken Merman (1849) is chosen as one of his poems from theearly poetic career; A Summer Night (1852) and The Buried Life (1852) are the poemsselected from the middle period; Dover Beach (1867) and The Rugby Chapel (1867)are two poems selected from his latter period.This thesis attempts to analyze Arnold’s theory of culture in his poems to showthat the early poems reflect the elementary or immature phase of his theory of culture,in which social problems are observed, but no practical solutions can he put forward;in the poems of the middle period, he came up with a brief system of the theory andsuggested many possible means concerning the improvement of individual; in thepoems of the latter period, he consummated the theory of culture by not onlysumming up the social problems with keen insight and profound thought, but alsooffering his remedies.