FIRST PAPER

Subject: POESÍA INGLESA DESDE LOS SIGLOS XIX Y XX  
Student’s name: Esteve Royo, Emma

Title of the paper: “She walks in beauty”.

Author: Lord George Gordon Noel Byron (poet, playwright, and satirist).

Publication: 1815.

Abstract:

The following work deals with the description of beauty in a
different way. Byron, the author, shows us this concept of beauty
as something human beings have. In this case, the woman that he
describes, whose beauty makes her be complete.
Throughout the poem, we see how the author plays with opposite
words to see the two ways of viewing something at the same time.
For example, “the night of cloudless climes and starry skies”,
where we can see a night which is dark with lots of stars which
are bright, “all that's best of dark and bright” or “one shade the
more, one ray the less”.
From what I’ve read, the poem seems to be a love poem because
of the description offered by the poet but, at the same time, there
is no word which expresses he is in love or something like that.
The odd is that Byron describes the woman physically and, not
only this, he focuses the poem on her face. That relation could
mean that he bases on mind expressing inside and head
expressing the external beauty of a person.
As a conclusion of the paper, I think that the poem I have chosen
is wonderful, although it made me doubt a lot if the poem is about
love or not, and it was a little difficult to me to know the point of
view of the poet. I have read some of his life, so then I could read
it more easily.

Academic year 2007/2008
© a.r.e.a./Dr.Vicente Forés López
© Emma Esteve Royo
emesro@alumni.uv.es
Universitat de València Press