This document provides a commentary and analysis of Lord Byron's poem "She Walks in Beauty". It summarizes that the poem is a descriptive work focused on portraying the exquisite beauty of an unnamed woman. Through vivid imagery and poetic devices, the poem compares aspects of the woman's beauty to nighttime elements like starry skies. It also notes how the poem depicts the woman's beauty not just in physical terms, but as reflecting her virtuous character and pure heart. The commentary analyzes the poetic techniques, structure, tone, and overall message of the poem in highlighting both the external and internal qualities of the woman.
This document provides a commentary and analysis of Lord Byron's poem "She Walks in Beauty". It summarizes that the poem is a descriptive work focused on portraying the exquisite beauty of an unnamed woman. Through vivid imagery and poetic devices, the poem compares aspects of the woman's beauty to nighttime elements like starry skies. It also notes how the poem depicts the woman's beauty not just in physical terms, but as reflecting her virtuous character and pure heart. The commentary analyzes the poetic techniques, structure, tone, and overall message of the poem in highlighting both the external and internal qualities of the woman.
This document provides a commentary and analysis of Lord Byron's poem "She Walks in Beauty". It summarizes that the poem is a descriptive work focused on portraying the exquisite beauty of an unnamed woman. Through vivid imagery and poetic devices, the poem compares aspects of the woman's beauty to nighttime elements like starry skies. It also notes how the poem depicts the woman's beauty not just in physical terms, but as reflecting her virtuous character and pure heart. The commentary analyzes the poetic techniques, structure, tone, and overall message of the poem in highlighting both the external and internal qualities of the woman.
As we take our first glance at this poem, She Walks in Beauty, by Lord Byron, and proceed to read the title, the first thought that comes to our mind is that this poem is about a woman and the description about herself and precisely, her beauty. The title itself shows allurement about the woman. What title reflects is that the poet is probably amazed by beauty of a woman and is writing this piece of literature in order to show dedication towards the beauty of the woman about which the poet is writing this poem. When we go through the whole poem and briefly interpret the stanzas and the lines of the poem the first impressions on our mind are all about how passionately the beauty of a nameless woman is portrayed by the poet. The way woman has been portrayed, shows the exquisiteness of the woman. Moreover it makes us think that what would have persuaded poet to describe the beauty of a woman so artistically. The central idea is something which is not a message or a moral or containing some emotional feelings, rather it is a descriptive poem about a glamorous woman. As we proceed through the poem we also notice that the way the lady is elucidated in is a unique one. So by now we understand all about the theme of the poem which is a womans mesmerizing description written by the poet probably due a strong impact on him by the womans beauty. What we think is a description of a woman is the poets passion about the womans charm. As we deeply explore the poem we are further surprised by the words of the poet as he has characterized the woman so beautifully. The poet has related the woman with such cornered things that we would never think about in our deepest thoughts. And the poet has also justified his comparisons and relations. Like the poet has written she walks in beauty, like the night. Here the poet is comparing the beauty with night. The poet probably wants us to think that woman is like night in way that nights have a state so magical and are filled with suspense. Similarly poet also wants us to assume that woman also carries her charm in a similar suspenseful way just like the night, having her own deeply hidden beauty. Poet has used simile for this. It is denoted by like the night. Also, there is no punctuation mark after night and hence the line continues of cloudless climes and starry skies. This phrase/line describes the night which indirectly depicts the qualities of the woman where cloudless climes refer to clear climate showing the ladys unquestionable beauty and starry skies referring to her glowing personality just like brightly twinkling stars. In the next line it is said all thats best of dark and bright which means that darkness and brightness both have some good qualities and the woman has the best of those in context with her beauty. Irony is used in this line by the mention of these opposite words. Also, the light during the night time is said to be mellowed and is shown more appropriate for the womans charm rather than daylight which is too gaudy. Hence the first stanza is all about how elements of night resemble the womans beauty and enhance it. In the first two lines of the second stanza the poet shows the perfection of the womans beauty by stating that even if one shade was added or one shade was taken away then it would make the beauty half-impaired which refers to a possible damage to the beauty. Also the poet calls that piece of allurement nameless grace which implies that the poet wasnt aware of the ladys name. And the grace shows how delicate and soft the womans beauty seemed to the poet. Also, the poet says this nameless grace waves in every raven trees, Or softly lightens over her face where raven trees refer to her dark black coloured hair. The poet says that the grace of her beauty is all over her fine hairs to her face. This shows that the beauty gently continues from her dark hairs to over her face. This is actually a tender piece of work where imagery plays a major role. The reader is forced to imagine the womans structure, her physics and her grace that she displays. And we perhaps start viewing in a similar way in which the poet does. In the ending two lines of the second stanza, the poet calls her face Where thoughts serenely sweet express, How pure, how dear their dwelling-place. It shows that thoughts are expressed through the womans face in a very calm and sweet manner. The poet has shown that womans face is a pure shade/shelter for emotions. Also, the poet seems to be impressed by the way thoughts are expressed. He uses the words serenely sweetly express to demonstrate how gracefully the thoughts are toted as per the poets point of view. Also poetic device: sibilance is used in this phrase since we hear the s sound consecutively in words serenely and sweetly as we sing along. The poet has excellently used the poetic devices by using them at the right places and making the poem sound very graceful and exquisite. It is hard to tell whether this art has been created so beautifully due to the poets skills or it is because of him being hypnotized by the womans beauty and writing this piece of literature out of his heart in a flow of rhythm. In the third stanza, we again see another divine piece of imagery. In the first three lines of that stanza, the poets persuasive lines force us to draw a picture of womans various constituents in our mind. The poet finds the woman to be very persuasive even though she doesnt say much out loud. She is quiet and rather elegant type. She doesnt speak much but her smiles and healthy blushes glow over her cheek and brow. That what poet sees and also wants us to imagine how mesmerized poet is due to that. Poet has used very delicate words for describing this quality of hers. Those words are soft, calm and eloquent. The best part of this poem is the delicacy included in the description of beauty by the poet. The poem ends in the third stanza with three heart touching lines. In these lines the poet first time describes about the womans good deeds, her peaceful and calm mind and her pure heart apart from her physical appearance her pretty face. The poet says days in goodness spent which shows that the woman truly a good woman and has spent time doing good works. Also that she has a peaceful mind where from the good thoughts come and most importantly an innocent heart. This is depicted through the lines A mind at peace with all below, A heart whose love is innocent! These ending lines are the most influential to a reader as they disclose the fascinating truth that the woman is not just pretty looking but is also the owner of a good and pure heart. This is the evidence that this is not a mere description of a woman influenced by the attraction towards her glamorous looks but is also about the real beauty within her. Poets words make it clear that she is a woman with innocent love. If we see look at the structure of the poem, we figure out that it is a usual poem. It has three stanzas which with six lines in each of them. This makes the poem go at a constant pace. The rhyming scheme is in ABABAB format throughout. And it is a short lyrical poem. The tone of the poem is pretty consistent throughout. The poem keeps on disclosing fascinating facts about the womans qualities one after another as we proceed through it. The mood/atmosphere of the poem is mesmerized with the flavour of the beauty and this artistic piece of literature. There are rising meters in all the lines if we technically talk about it. Iambic meters are found throughout the poem. As we conclude, we find that throughout the poem the poet is just admiring the woman as per his vision. There is no clue that the poet is falling for that woman but seems to be amazed by the beautiful creation present in front of his eyes. Yet the poem is very smoothly written and surely soothes the readers mind.