(Love)"She walks in Beauty""On Stella's Birthday" Rex
In "On Stella's Birthday," the tone is very playful, like the speaker
points out Stella's size and age are doubled, Thetwo things -age and shape-
almost every woman regards them as the most important elements as for
being a woman. However, here we know Stella is lovely not because her
apearance now but her beauth, size, years and wit 16 years ago in the
speakers's mind. That is, Stella lives in the speaker's mind, so no matter
how great Stella has changed, in his eye, she's always the idol.
But in "She walks in Beauty." the speaker describes her as "One shade
the more, one ray the less, had half impair'd the nameless grace." We Chinese
have an idiom:"ªÅÖ¦X«×',and I think it is exact explanation to it. So
far as the speaker is concerned, all as to her are so agreeable, like the
way she walks, herthoughts, her smiles,her aspect, her eyes, her tress,her
face/cheek,etc.That's too perfect to be a real one, isn't it? She seems
to an apple in the speaker's eye. If we identify the speaker in "On Stella's
Birthday" as Stalla's close friend, we can judge that the speaker in "She
walks in Beuty"be the adorer of the woman in the poem. Without such
passion for her, the lines
can't be completed so eloquently.
Rex