4.

Touchstone Method

Introduction:

The act of comparison and evaluation holds a unique and important place in literature.

Evaluation of different verses, poems, poets, theories, historical figures, all affects the way

anything is viewed by the people. Just as looking through a pair of glasses changes the way

someone sees an object, using one thing as a framework for understanding the second thing

changes the way the second thing is viewed.

In literature, evaluations are made on the daily basis, readers find all sorts of reasons to admire

a particular piece of writing, a poet, or even a school of poets, but mostly the evaluation is

based on abstract standards. The Victorian poet and critic ‘Matthew Arnold’ created a concrete,

comparative method of criticism to judge the merit of a piece of written work. It was created to

form an estimate of the real excellence and beauty of the poetic work and was introduced into

literary criticism in “the Study of Poetry”, where Arnold gives Hamlet’s dying words to Horatio as

an example of a touchstone.

The Central Idea:

Matthew Arnold was basically a classicist. He admired the ancient Greek, Roman, and French

authors as the models to be followed by the modern English authors. That’s why he introduced

a method to judge a poetic work using classical works as the base. According to Arnold, a real

classic is a work which belongs to the class of the very best. It can be recognized by placing it

beside the known classics of the world. Those known classics can serve as the touchstone by

which the merit of contemporary poetic work can be tested.

So, in order to judge a poet’s work properly, a critic should compare it to passages taken from

works of great masters of poetry, and those passages should be applied as touchstones to

other poetry. Even a single line or selected quotation will serve the purpose. If the other work

moves us in the same way as these lines and expressions do, then it really is a great work,

otherwise not.
 The Recipe to Judge Great Poetry:

Arnold suggests a recipe by which great poetry can be judged. He suggests that the lines and

expressions of the great masters of poetry should be kept in mind and they should be used to

detect the presence or absence of high poetic quality and also the degree of that quality. Short

passages, even single lines will serve the purpose.

Arnold gives an illustration by quoting two lines from Homer, another three lines from Homer,

another line from Homer, a few lines from Dante, a few lines from Shakespeare, and another

few from John Milton. Arnold says that the poets quoted by him are enough to enable anyone to

form clear and sound judgments of any other poetry and to conduct a real estimate.

Real Classic and the Dubious Classic:

Matthew Arnold offered his touchstone method to distinguish a real classic from a dubious

classic and to form a real estimate of poetry. He says “a dubious classic, let us shift him; if he is

a false classic, let us explode him . But he is a real classic, if his works belong to the class of

the very best, then the great thing for us to feel and enjoy his work as deeply as ever we can.” A

best classic is recognized by placing it beside the known classics of the world.

Superiority over the Personal and Historical Methods of Poetry:

This method was recommended by Arnold to overcome the shortcomings of the personal and

historical estimates of a poem because both historical and personal estimate goes in vain.

Arnold says than the personal estimate should be avoided because it will lead to wrong

judgments. The historic estimate or judging a poet from the point of view of his importance in

the course of literary history is also not a true judgment of a poet. Its historical importance may

make us rate the work as higher than it really deserves. In order to form a real estimate, one

should have the ability to distinguish a real classic. At this point, Arnold offers his theory of

touchstone method.
Arnold gives a concrete example of the fallacies of the historical approach. Caedmon's position

is important in the historical sense but it would be wrong to hold him in the same level as

Milton poetically because of this historical position. So, in order to find the truly excellent

poetry, one should form a real estimate of poetry as opposed to historical estimate and

personal estimate.

Limitations:

The touchstone method has its own limitations. Those who do not agree with this theory of

comparative criticism say that Arnold is too strict, too exacting in comparing a simple modern

poet with the ancient master poet.

Also, this theory has set limited criteria for work to be great where as great works do not

require any criteria. All great work cannot be of same type and cannot be squeezed or fixed in

the same frame of classical great works.

With too much importance on judging a poetic work based on the classical works, one might

fear that the some of the perfectly well-written works would fade into insignificance.

And, the method of comparing passage with a passage is not a sufficient test for determining

the value of a work as a whole. Arnold himself insisted that we must judge a poem by the 'total

impression' and not by its fragments.

Conclusion:

Despite the limitations, the touchstone method is one of the greatest contributions of Matthew

Arnold. It provides a concrete form of comparing great poets, and has proved to be an

invaluable aid to appreciation of any kind of art. The touchstone method is helpful not merely

to compare the masterpiece and the lesser work, but the good with the not so good, the sincere

with the not quite sincere, it distinguishes them all from each other.