The Study of Poetry Character Analysis

Matthew Arnold

Matthew Arnold (1822–1888) was an English poet and literary critic. While his poems were generally well regarded in his lifetime and are considered a leading example of Victorian-era lyric poetry, he is now best known… read analysis of Matthew Arnold

Homer

Homer (8th century B.C.E) was the ancient Greek figure credited with composing The Odyssey and The Iliad, epic poems that are considered foundational works in Western culture. For Matthew Arnold, Homer’s works are… read analysis of Homer

Dante Alighieri

Dante Alighieri (1265–1321) was an Italian poet and the author of The Divine Comedy, a narrative poem that is considered the greatest poetic work in the Italian language. According to Matthew Arnold, Dante’s… read analysis of Dante Alighieri

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare (1564–1616) was an English poet and playwright who is often considered the supreme poet and dramatist of the English language. Matthew Arnold produces extracts from Shakespeare’s Henry IV and Hamlet as examples of… read analysis of William Shakespeare

John Milton

John Milton (1608–1674) was an English poet and the author of Paradise Lost, a foundational work of English poetry. Milton is held out by Matthew Arnold as an example of an undisputed classic poet—a… read analysis of John Milton

William Wordsworth

William Wordsworth (1770–1850) was an English poet of the Romantic period. Matthew Arnold is complimentary of Wordsworth’s poetry but stops short of praising it outright. Arnold uses Wordsworth’s definition of poetry—namely, that it is the… read analysis of William Wordsworth

Geoffrey Chaucer

Geoffrey Chaucer (1340s–1400) was an English poet and the author of the Canterbury Tales. A highly regarded poet in the English canon, Chaucer is used by Matthew Arnold as a test case for arriving… read analysis of Geoffrey Chaucer

Robert Burns

Robert Burns (1759–1796) was a Scottish poet who is considered the national poet of Scotland. Matthew Arnold looks closely at Burns’s verse, which he clearly admires, and explains why it falls short of the high… read analysis of Robert Burns

Minor Characters

Saint Beuve

Saint Beuve (1804–1869) was a French literary critic. Matthew Arnold uses the example of Saint Beuve’s conversation with Napoleon Bonaparte to introduce the idea that poetry is no place for charlatanism.

Napoleon Bonaparte

Napoleon Bonaparte (1769–1821) was Emperor of the French. Matthew Arnold writes of Napoleon in connection with Saint Beuve to demonstrate that, in contrast to politics, the realm of poetry does not welcome charlatans.

Charles d’Héricault

Charles d’Héricault (1823–1899) was a French literary critic. Matthew Arnold rejects d’Héricault’s idea that readers should strive to strip great poets of their deity-like status. On the contrary, Arnold argues, readers should appreciate the difference between the truly great poets and the others.

M. Vitet

Ludovic Vitet (1802–1873) was a French politician and literary critic. Matthew Arnold dismisses Vitet’s praise of the Song of Roland as excessive, an example of the fallacy of the historic estimate supplanting the real estimate of a poem.

John Dryden

John Dryden (1631–1700) was an English poet and literary critic. Matthew Arnold professes admiration for Dryden’s verse, which he praises as exemplary verse for the epoch of prose, before concluding that it falls short of the standard of classic poetry.

Alexander Pope

Alexander Pope (1688–1744) was an English poet. Like John Dryden, Pope is considered by Matthew Arnold to be an exemplary poet of the prose era, but not a truly great poet.

Thomas Gray

Thomas Gray (1716–1771) was an English poet. Matthew Arnold admits that Gray approaches the standard of the great poets, specifically because he models his verse so closely on theirs.

Percy Bysshe Shelley

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) was an English poet of the Romantic era. Matthew Arnold mentions Shelley as an example of a poet who, being so close in time to Arnold’s present, was likely to be read under the influence of the personal estimate instead of the real estimate.

Lord Byron

Lord Byron (1788–1824) was an English poet of the Romantic era. Like Percy Bysshe Shelley and William Wordsworth, Lord Byron is considered too close to the present time (in Matthew Arnold’s day) to safely arrive at a real estimate of his poetry.

The Study of Poetry Characters