Matthew Arnolds Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems

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Rustum and Other Poems, by Matthew Arnold
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Title: Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and Other Poems
Author: Matthew Arnold
Release Date: September 3, 2004 [EBook #13364]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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ARNOLD POEMS ***
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MATTHEW ARNOLD'S
SOHRAB AND RUSTUM
AND OTHER POEMS
EDITED, WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES
BY
JUSTUS COLLINS CASTLEMAN
HEAD OF ENGLISH DEPARTMENT, SOUTH DIVISION

HIGH SCHOOL, MILWAUKEE
1905

CONTENTS
PREFACE
INTRODUCTION
A Short Life of Arnold
Arnold the Poet

Arnold the Critic
Chronological List of Arnold's Works

Contemporary Authors
Bibliography
SELECTIONS FROM ARNOLD'S POETICAL WORKS
NARRATIVE POEMS
Sohrab and Rustum
Saint Brandan
The Forsaken Merman

Tristram and Iseult
LYRICAL POEMS
The Church of Brou
Requiescat
Consolation
A Dream
Lines
written in Kensington Gardens
The Strayed Reveller
Morality

Dover Beach
Philomela
Human Life
Isolation--To Marguerite

Kaiser Dead
The Last Word
Palladium
Revolutions

Self-Dependence
A Summer Night
Geist's Grave
Epilogue--To
Lessing's Laocoön
SONNETS
Quiet Work
Shakespeare
Youth's Agitations
Austerity of Poetry

Worldly Place
East London
West London
ELEGIAC POEMS
Memorial Verses
The Scholar-Gipsy
Thyrsis
Rugby Chapel
NOTES
INDEX

INTRODUCTION
A SHORT LIFE OF ARNOLD
Matthew Arnold, poet and critic, was born in the village of Laleham,
Middlesex County, England, December 24, 1822. He was the son of Dr.
Thomas Arnold, best remembered as the great Head Master at Rugby
and in later years distinguished also as a historian of Rome, and of
Mary Penrose Arnold, a woman of remarkable character and intellect.
Devoid of stirring incident, and, on the whole, free from the
eccentricities so common to men of genius, the story of Arnold's life is
soon told. As a boy he lived the life of the normal English lad, with its
healthy routine of task and play. He was at school at both Laleham and
Winchester, then at Rugby, where he attracted attention as a student
and won a prize for poetry. In 1840 he was elected to an open
scholarship at Balliol College, Oxford, and the next year matriculated
for his university work. Arnold's career at Oxford was a memorable one.
While here he was associated with such men as John Duke Coleridge,
John Shairp, Dean Fraser, Dean Church, John Henry Newman, Thomas
Hughes, the Froudes, and, closest of all, with Arthur Hugh Clough,
whose early death he lamented in his exquisite elegiac poem--Thyrsis.
Among this brilliant company Arnold moved with ease, the recognized
favorite. Having taken the Newdigate prize for English verse, and also
having won a scholarship, he was graduated with honors in 1844, and
in March of the following year had the additional distinction of being
elected a Fellow of Oriel, the crowning glory of an Oxford graduate.
He afterward taught classics for a short time at Rugby, then in 1847
accepted the post of private secretary to the Marquis of Lansdowne,
Lord President of the Council, which position he occupied until 1851,
when he was appointed Lay Inspector of Schools by the Committee on
Education. The same year he married Frances Lucy Wightman,
daughter of Sir William Wightman, judge of the Court of the Queen's
Bench.
Arnold's record as an educator is unparalleled in the history of

England's public schools. For more than thirty-five years he served as
inspector and commissioner, which offices he filled with efficiency. As
inspector he was earnest, conscientious, versatile; beloved alike by
teachers and pupils. The Dean of Salisbury likened his appearance to
inspect the school at Kiddermaster, to the admission of a ray of light
when a shutter is suddenly opened in a darkened room. All-in-all, he
valued happy-appearing children, and kindly sympathetic teachers,
more than excellence in grade reports. In connection with the duties of
his office as commissioner, he travelled frequently on the Continent to
inquire into foreign methods of primary and secondary education. Here
he found much that was worth while, and often carried back to London
larger suggestions and ideas than the national mind was ready to accept.
Under his supervision, however, the school system of England was
extensively revised and improved. He resigned his position under the
Committee of Council on Education, in 1886, two years before his
death.
In the meantime Arnold's pen had not been idle. His first volume of
verse, The Strayed Reveller and Other Poems, appeared (1848), and
although quietly received, slowly won its way into public favor. The
next year the narrative poem, The Sick King in Bokhara, came out, and
was followed in turn by a third volume in 1853, under the title of
Empedocles on Etna and Other Poems. By this time Arnold's
reputation as a poet was established, and in 1857 he was elected
Professor of Poetry at