Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley Flashcards
1
Q
Story + message of ‘Ozymandias’:
A
- The narrator is recalling his meeting of a traveller who tells the narrator about the statue of Ozymandias
- Ozymandias may also be an allegory about individual selfishness
- The king constructed a statue to declare his own greatness, effectively as the ruler of the world; however, nothing around his statue remains
- He seems to have lived only for his own glory and his own benefit; yet this “colossal wreck” seems to imply that striking such an attitude and living in such fashion will, in the end, leave one miserable and lonely, without support or friendship - one’s social and psychological landscape will be “boundless and bare.”
- Power is ephemeral (doesn’t last forever)
o Ultimately nature and time last forever – Shelley was a romantic poet
o No matter how much pride and how large your hubris is, it will all be washed away by time and nature
2
Q
What is the tone of ‘Ozymandias’?
A
- Mocking and sarcastic tone
- Reveals the irony of the king’s intention juxtaposed against the fate of the ruined statue
- Ozymandias’s speech - arrogant and boastful tone
3
Q
What is the imagery used in Ozymandias?
A
- Central image is of the shattered statue of Ozymandias – “shatter’d visage”, “two vast and trunkless legs”, “wrinkled lip”
o These images help the readers visualise the status of the broken statue - Imagery surrounding nature and the vast desert the crumbling statue was found in
4
Q
What was Percy Bysshe Shelley part of?
A
- Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792 – 1822) was one of a group of poets called The Romantics
- The Romantic poets often wrote about nature and strong emotions (the term ‘Romantics’ does not relate to romance as in love)
5
Q
How wealthy was Percy Bysshe Shelley?
A
He came from a wealthy family and was in line to inherit both riches and his grandfather’s role as an MP
6
Q
What was Percy Bysshe’s Shelley’s education like?
A
He was expelled from university for writing about atheism which led to his father disinheriting him
7
Q
What was Shelley known as and what were his views?
A
- Shelley was well known as a ‘radical’ during his lifetime, critical of both the British monarchy and government and sympathising with the ideology of the French Revolution
- As Shelley was highly critical of the British government, he wanted to pull his money out of any kind of investment that supported the government
8
Q
How does «Tell that its sculptor well those passions read» tie in with Romanticism
A
- ties in with the traditional Romantic era idea of everlasting art; how humans are ephemeral, but art is forever
- In Romanticism, imagery played a key role in the visualization of the subject
- Ozymandias, the King, has his statue pictured with a frown and a daunting sense of command
- The sculptor is depicting the overwhelming power and fear that was struck into the people
9
Q
Context for Ozymandias’s statue:
A
- The statue Shelley refers to in the poem is a real statue: pieces of it were discovered by an Italian archaeologist in 1817 and bits of it were transported back to England to go on display in the British Museum
- The statue of Ramesses II of Egypt (the name Ozymandias comes from the Greek name for the Egyptian King)
- Ramesses II began his reign in 1279 BC and he was one of the most powerful pharaohs of the Egyptian empire
- Ramesses was well-known for erecting vast monuments in his own image, highlighting his extravagance and his own opinion of himself as a living God
10
Q
When did Shelley write this poem?
A
- Shelley apparently wrote ‘Ozymandias’ after hearing about its discovery
- He and a fellow poet both wrote poems about it – Shelley’s poem was published in a newspaper (The Enquirer in 1818)
11
Q
- “I met a traveller from an antique land”
A
- poem opens in a classic ‘traveller’s tale’ mode, with the narrator retelling a story
- The language is unadorned
- the word “antique” suggests that something interesting will emerge
- the rest of the poem consists of a quotation - the speaker of the poem is barely present, but the traveller-narrator who takes over gives the story the flavour of a legendary tale
- “antique” – fragility, from a bygone era
12
Q
- “Two vast and trunkless legs of stone / Stand in the desert…”
A
- “trunkless legs” – informs the reader of the statue’s lack of body and therefore lack of heart
- this may signify a lack of connection between his body and his brain – Ozymandias has no insight or intellect to recognise his limitations
- half-rhyme of “stone” and “frown”- structure imperfect, broken down like statue
13
Q
- “Near them, on the sand, / Half sunk, a shattered visage lies,”
A
- remains of the upper portion of the statue have eroded and collapsed, remaining as only sand-to-be
- next to the legs is the face buried and in pieces
- incomplete as only “half” his face us shown – 2 sides of human nature?
- to be successful leader he had to keep his personal side private and hidden
- suggests that he believes his power to be solid and unshakeable, but it vanished after his death – an illusion in his mind that crumbled with time
- “shatter’d” – sharp + strong adjective, contraction adds to the force of the word
- sibilance – “sh”’s and “s”’s in “sand”, “sunk” and “shattered” – perhaps like wind whistling over the sand dunes
- symbolise the eeriness of passing time and degraded power
14
Q
- “whose frown, / And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, / Tell that its sculptor well those passions read”
A
- The contrast between the hot desert and Ozymandias’ cold sneer calls attention to his haughtiness – no warm ruler
- “sneer” – contemptuous + unpleasant sound which reflects the meaning
- “cold command” – hard alliterative “c”’s and long vowel might imitate the harsh sound of a self-important man giving orders, looked at people in disdain
- “tell that its sculptor well those passions read” – irony, the fact that Ozymandias was so apparently desperate to be remembered, yet it is the sculptor that is praised and admired for managing to capture the arrogant looks of his employer
15
Q
- “’My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings; / Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!’”
A
- bold + confident statement declaring strange, long, harsh-sounding, exotic name
- only line which contains the king’s name – has an extra syllable, departure from regular iambic pentameter of the rest of the poem
- “King of Kings” has rhythmic resonance – the Pharaoh is setting himself up as God
- heavily ironic considering his memorial statue is described as being destroyed and “shatter’d” – makes him look foolish and highlights the arrogance that still exists in some rules
- “ye mighty” – archaic term distances the reader, lost it’s impact
- “and despair!” – chilling and signify inhuman cruelty + 2 words sound slow, elongated and ominous
- “despair!” – exclamatory sentence, ironic as no one in the desert to listen to his demand
