http://www.gradesaver.com/lord-byrons-poems/study-guide/summary-she-walks-in-beauty-like-the-night The poet describes a woman who âwalks in beauty, like the night/Of cloudless climes and starry skiesâ (lines 1-2). Immediately the light of stars and the shadow of night are brought forth as contrasts, foreshadowing the further contrasts the poet notices regarding this beautiful woman. Seeing her eyes, he declares that in her face âall thatâs best of dark and brightâ are joined. Her beauty is contrasted to the âgaudyâ daylight.
In the second stanza, the poet reflects on the balance in the womanâs beauty: âOne shade the more, one ray the lessâ (line 7) would hinder the ânameless graceâ which surrounds her. He then turns to her inner life, seeing her external beauty as an expression of thoughts that dwell in a place (perhaps her mind, or her beautiful head and face) both âpureâ and âdearâ (line 18).
The final stanza returns to her face, but again sees the silent expression of peace and calm in her cheek, brow, and smiles. Her pleasant facial expressions eloquently but innocently express her inner goodness and peacefulness.
Analysis
âShe Walks in Beautyâ is written in iambic tetrameter, âa meter commonly found in hymns and associated with âsincerityâ and âsimplicityââ (Moran 2). Byronâs chosen meter conveys to the reader both his purity of intent (there is but one subject for this poem, the ladyâs virtuous beauty) and a poetic parallel to his subject (the ladyâs beauty arises from her purity or simplicity of nature). It is an astonishingly chaste poem given its authorâs reputation for licentiousness, lust, and debauchery.
Byron wrote this poem about Mrs. Wilmot, his cousin Robert Wilmotâs wife. It echoes Wordsworthâs earlier âThe Solitary Reaperâ (1807) in its conceit: the speakerâs awe upon seeing a woman walking in her own aura of beauty. While ostensibly about a specific woman, the poem extends to encompass the unobtainable and ideal. The lady is not beautiful in herself, but she walks in an aura of Beauty (Flesch 1). In contrast to popular conceptions, her beauty is not easily described as brilliant or radiant, but it is also dark âlike the nightâ (line 1) However, âall thatâs best of dark and brightâ (line 3) meet in her face and eyes, suggesting that while she walks in a dark beauty, she is herself a brighter, more radiant beauty. To further convolute the image, the woman is described as having âraven tress[es]â (black hair) (line 9), connecting her to the darkness, while the ânameless graceâ (line 8) âlightensâ her faceâpossibly a play on the word, meaning the grace alights on her face, but also including the brighter aspect of lightening her countenance.
Indeed, the beauty of Wilmot is found largely in its balance of opposites: the darkness she walks in (and her dark hair) counterpoise her fair skin and the bright pureness of her soul. In this lady, the âtender lightâ is âmellowed,â in contrast to the âgaudy dayâ which has only the glaring sun and no shade to soften its radiance. Thus the ladyâs simple, inner perfection produces a beauty superior to nature itself.
This grace is ânamelessâ in that it is ineffable. It is a common idea to say that there is no way for human word or verse to encompass it, so it must remain nameless even as the speaker perceives it clearly. Prose cannot come close to a description of this abstract beauty, so the speaker must attempt it in verse.
These issues raise a concern that the woman seems so pure because she is so simple; she wears her thoughts directly on her face, and she shows no evidence of discrimination of better from worse. Her mind is âat peace with all belowâ (line 17), and she loves innocently. If she is beautiful like the night, perhaps her mind truly is like a sky without any clouds of trouble or confusion. In contrast, she has been able to spend her days in âgoodness,â the tints in her face glowing like stars in the sky, small punctuations in a vast emptiness above.