worshipping the very hem of her dress

reading over my lecture notes on Great Expectations i saw that matthew arnold's 'dover beach' had been cited in reference to the changing nature of a new industrial society in England's 19th century. With Dickens an evolutionist and the threat of Darwinist thinking causing thrusts in the Protestant Church of England I was reminded of Pip and Estella's fated relationship in relation to Arnold's melancholic poem. I will not say romance, because Pip's love was wholly unrequited for the greater part of the novel. Only with a chance reunion in the final and (altered) chapter does the reader ever receive some kind of satisfaction that Estella and Pip were ever truly meant for each other and might enjoy a life together. according to arnold, as long as two lovers have each other they might be safe from the fallacies of the approaching darkness of a mortal world.

i remain unconvinced. for me, ignorant armies still clash by night.