Ozymandias (Percy Bysshe Shelley) Flashcards
“I met a traveller from an antique land”
frame narrative = distancing from subject → unreliable narrator
• “antique” = suggests decay + grandeur long gone
• “traveller” = oral storytelling tradition → power reduced to myth - not relevant anymore
Shelley begins with a removed voice, emphasising how even the greatest rulers become forgotten tales.
“ who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone”
Who said - story repeated to others - legend/passed down - changes over time like his power
However, the story is still being told today - his power & impact still carries on even if it’s not as strong
juxtaposition “vast” vs “trunkless” = broken ambition - he is no longer
vast - greatness
Trunkless - ruin - everything eventually decays
• synecdoche = legs without body → fractured legacy
• visual irony = monument built to immortalise now incomplete
Shelley undermines the illusion of permanence by showing how grandeur is reduced to fragments.
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies”
• metaphor “shattered visage” = ruined identity, loss of power
• “half sunk” = being swallowed by time/nature
• plosive “shattered” = violence of destruction
Shelley uses the broken statue to show that time erodes even the most powerful egos.
“Whose frown, / And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command”
Cold command - plosive c sound - arrogant & harsh rule
• triadic listing = totalising description of tyranny
• sibilance = serpentine, sinister tone
• consonance = harshness, cold authority
Shelley portrays Ozymandias as cruel and self-important, remembered not for greatness but for disdain
“The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed”
• ambiguity = artist mocking ruler or ruler mocking people?
• juxtaposition “mocked” vs “fed” = dual legacy of power
• metonymy = “hand” and “heart” as symbols of rule + intention
- ruler thrived on power/control but his heart just as lifeless as the statue
Shelley implies rulers may be remembered only through the satirical lens of artists, not the legacy they wanted.
“And on the pedestal these words appear”
• formal tone = self-importance of inscription
• “pedestal” = irony → base of power now isolated, meaningless
- physically and mentally elevated at the time
• enjambment = physical separation from rest of statue
Shelley highlights the gap between what rulers claim and what remains—empty titles on broken stone.
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: / Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
• biblical allusion “king of kings” = self-deification, arrogance - supreme/god like
• imperative “Look” = commanding voice of past tyrant
• dramatic irony = no “works” remain → grandeur undone - even greatest empires collapse
not capitalised - king of kings - ironic - current unimportance
Shelley uses the inscription to mock pride, showing how tyrants overestimate their place in history.
“Nothing beside remains.”
brutal caesura = emphatic contrast with grand boast
- his empire is done - full stop
• stark monosyllables = crushing finality
• irony = ultimate emptiness of power - futility of human endeavours against passing of time
Shelley delivers a devastating truth—ego and empire both crumble, leaving only silence.
“The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
• alliteration = haunting stillness, endless decay
• metaphor “level sands” = time as the great equaliser
• image of vast desert = insignificance of human achievement
Shelley ends with nature’s quiet triumph—history and pride are engulfed by the indifferent stretch of time.
Title: Ozymandias
• name = Greek rendering of Pharaoh Ramesses II → evokes ancient imperial power
• exoticism = grandeur now reduced to a forgotten name
• ironic tone = title suggests legacy, but poem exposes insignificance
• sound = sharp, dramatic → theatricality of ego
Structure & Form
sonnet form = traditionally love/praise → subverted to mock hubris
• Petrarchan + Shakespearean blend = fractured form mirrors ruined statue
• volta = “And on the pedestal…” → shift to irony
• enjambment = disrupts control → reflects collapse of order
Context
Romantic poet = challenged authority, praised nature
• Shelley = atheist, anti-monarchist → opposed tyranny + power
• inspired by statue of Ramesses II sent to Britain
• poem written during age of colonialism → commentary on empire
Themes
• Power and its transience
• Arrogance and downfall
• Art as a preserver of truth
• Nature and time as ultimate forces
• Human ambition vs mortality
