Analysis of She Walks in Beauty

1
Analysis of She Walks in Beauty
2

• As the title says, SHE walks in beauty, the main
  theme of the poem is the description of a lady,
  the enumeration of certain qualities that the
  author considers give her beauty. The
  introduction of the verb to walk in the title
  is important because it gives connotations of
  advancing, not only in space but also in time. It
  makes reference to the movement of walking,
  introducing the reader this way into a
  bidimensional reading which is going to be
  constant through out all of the poem.

3

• The center of the poem is the lady, and the
  author expresses that central importance by
  capitalizing the whole pronoun SHE .

4

• As I said before, the observation, and the
  following description of Byron leads the reader
  to a dual dimension that enriches the poem.
  Evidences of this dualism are some interesting
  contrasts reflected in the poem line 3 and all
  thats best of dark and bright that gives us the
  idea that such a lady includes amongst her
  qualities light and darkness, good and evil, she
  is a mixture of both. This is not an archetypical
  description that gives only a positive and
  idealized point of view. But, being a Romantic
  description it is also a profound and realistic
  one. The vision of the poet describes a beauty of
  shade and ray, giving us again the impression
  that she is not only positive.

5

• Another interesting contrast that reinforces the
  dualism is that of introducing the word
  mellowd in line 5, giving her qualities of
  mature and experienced beauty, and it is in
  contrast with the last word of the poem
  innocent, this way Byron expresses the
  contradictions that the beauty of that lady can
  posses.

6

• It is also important the contrast that Byron
  makes in the last two verses with the words
  mind and heart by separating them and making
  a clear distinction between the experience and
  the peace of her mind, and the innocence of her
  heart, of her feelings. This makes reference to
  the eternal separation of feelings and thoughts,
  the fight of the two realities inside of a
  person, in this case, the lady. Dualism is
  present in the poem to the end.

7

• It is important the introduction of the theme of
  the passing time and the aquisition of
  experience. Evidence of this is verse 16 where
  the author atributes the lady the property of
  experience of days in goodness spent.
• The vocabulary that Byron uses is clear, simple
  and accessible to all kind of readers. The
  Semantic field is based on two branches on the
  one hand the introduction of terms referring to
  the phisical description of the lady face,
  cheek, brow, aspect, smiles, eyes. On the other
  hand they are in contrast with terms linked to a
  more internal description thought, grace,
  tender, peace, love, calm stressing again this
  bidimensional property of the lady.

8

• The tone used by the author is serious, and this
  can be observed in the strict use of the
  Structure
• All the verses have 8 syllables, the rhymes are
  regular and perfect ababab cdcdcd efefef.
• The conclussion of this analysis is that the
  vision of the lady that Byron gives us is a
  mixture of several elements, always dual, full of
  contradictions that takes the reader to a more
  realistic anc complete vision of the conception
  of a lady that the author has. It is not a simple
  vision where everything is lovely, positive and
  innocent, it is not a naive expression of
  feelings that can blind the lover taking only
  into account the positive qualities of the lady.
  It is more a contrast between two realities, mind
  and heart, experience and innocence, the physical
  and the psychological worlds.

9

• Type of Work and Year Written  She Walks in
  Beauty is a lyric poem centering on the
  extraordinary beauty of a young lady. George
  Gordon Byron (commonly known as Lord Byron) wrote
  the poem in 1814 and published it in a
  collection, Hebrew Melodies, in 1815. 
• Background
• On the evening of June 11, 1814, Byron attended
  a party with his friend, James Wedderburn
  Webster, at the London home of Lady Sarah
  Caroline Sitwell. Among the other guests was the
  beautiful Mrs. Anne Beatrix Wilmot, the wife of
  Byrons first cousin, Sir Robert Wilmot. Her
  exquisite good looks dazzled Byron and inspired
  him to write She Walks in Beauty. (In 1823,
  Wilmot inherited the estate of his wifes father,
  Eusebius Horton. In accordance with the will, Sir
  Robert assumed the additional surname Horton.
  Thereafter, he was known as Robert Wilmot-Horton
  and his wife as Anne Wilmot-Horton.) 
• Theme
• The theme of the poem is the woman's exceptional
  beauty, internal as well as external. The first
  stanza praises her physical beauty. The second
  and third stanzas praise both her physical and
  spiritual, or intellectual, beauty. 

10

• Rhyme Scheme and Meter The rhyme scheme of the
  first stanza is ababab the second stanza,
  cdcdcd and the third stanza, efefef. All the end
  rhymes are masculine. The meter is predominantly
  iambic tetrameter, a pattern in which a line has
  four pairs of unstressed and stressed
  syllableseight syllables in all. The first two
  lines demonstrate the pattern followed throughout
  the poem except for line 6, which has nine
  syllables 
•           1................2...........
  3...............4 She WALKS in BEAU ty, LIKE
  the NIGHT         1.................2...........
  ...... 3...............4 Of CLOUD less CLIMES
  and STAR ry SKIES
• Enjambment Lines 1 and 2 contain enjambment
  (carrying the sense of one line of verse over to
  the next line without a pause). Thus, there is no
  pause after night. Pauses occur at the end of the
  other lines.
• Use of Alliteration
• Alliteration occurs frequently to enhance the
  appeal of the poem to the ear. The most obvious
  examples of this figure of speech include the
  following
• Line 2....cloudless climes starry skies.  Line
  6....day denies  Line 8....Had half Line
  9....Which waves Line 11...serenely sweet Line
  14...So soft, so Line 18...Heart Whose

11

• Other Figures of Speech Examples of other figures
  of speech are the following
• Lines 1, 2......Simile comparing the movement of
  the beautiful woman to the movement of the skies 
  
• Line 6............Metonymy, in which heaven is
  substituted for God or for the upper atmosphere
• Lines 8-10......Metaphor comparing grace, a
  quality, to a perceivable phenomenon
• Lines 11-12....Metaphor and personification
  comparing thoughts to people metaphor and
  personification comparing the mind to a home
  (dwelling-place)
• Lines 13-16....Metaphor and personification
  comparing the woman's cheek and brow to persons
  who tell of days in goodness spent

12

• Imagery Light and Darkness Byron presents an
  ethereal portrait of the young woman in the first
  two stanzas by contrasting white with black and
  light with shadow in the same way that nature
  presents a portrait of the firmamentand the
  landscape belowon a cloudless starlit evening.
  He tells the reader in line 3 that she combines
  the best of dark and bright (bright here
  serving as an noun rather than an adjective) and
  notes that darkness and light temper each other
  when they meet in her raven hair. Byron's words
  thus turn opposites into compeers working
  together to celebrate beauty.

13

• Study Questions and Writing Topics
• 1...What is beauty? To what extent does beauty
  depend on personality? 2...Was Byron declaring
  his love for the young woman or simply
  celebrating her beauty? 3...Write a poem about a
  qualitystrength, generosity, kindness, beauty,
  charm, selflessness, etc.  4...Write an essay
  that analyzes another poem by Byron.