Byronic

adjective

By·​ron·​ic bī-ˈrä-nik 

: of, relating to, or suggestive of Lord Byron or his writings

What he lacked in the Byronic charisma of his brother, he seemed to gain in nobility …

—Zadie Smith

especially : romantic sense 4b

His imagination … inspired in him a desire for the Byronic attitude; and he was torn between a morbid self-consciousness and a conviction that he owed it to himself to be gallant.

—William Somerset Maugham

Examples of Byronic in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Fennell’s answer was lighter fluid to English majors’ fire, one that has raged online ever since Elordi was announced to play Emily Brontë’s Byronic hero in 2024. — Jasmine Vojdani, Vulture, 10 Feb. 2026

This version of Wuthering Heights stars Margot Robbie as 18-year-old Catherine Earnshaw and sees Jacob Elordi further establishing his Gothic bona fides as the Byronic hero Heathcliff. — Ben Rosenstock, Time, 26 Dec. 2025

As Dinsdale sees it, Emily drawing on a Byronic image is fitting for her development as an artist and writer. — Eli Wizevich, Smithsonian Magazine, 16 Apr. 2025

Will Barry Keoghan don a waistcoat and scraggly mane to play our brooding Byronic hero? — Radhika Seth, Vogue, 15 July 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1823, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for Byronic

• atonic
• benthonic
• bionic
• bosonic
• bubonic
• canonic
• carbonic
• cyclonic
• demonic
• dystonic
• hadronic
• harmonic