OZYMANDIAS-P.B. SHELLEY

FA4 Group Activity

GROUP MEMBERSROLL NO. NAME

2 ANUJ GARG11 KHYATISH DESAI14 NAMAN AGARWAL17 PANKAJ CHOUDHARY31 VIDIT KEWALIYA

ABOUT THE POET

ABOUT THE POETBorn 4 August 1792

Field Place, Horsham, Sussex, England

Died 8 July 1822 (aged 29)Lerici, Kingdom of Sardinia(now Italy)

Occupation Poet, dramatist, essayist, novelist

Literary Movement Romantic

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY The son of a Rich Tory Squire, Percy Bysshe Shelley was educated at Eton and then sent to Oxford.

Shelley came under the influence of revolutionary ideas of the English philosopher, William Godwin, whose daughter, Mary Godwin he ultimately married.

In 1818, Shelley left for Italy; he drowned in the Bay of Spezia in 1822

POEM

ABOUT THE POEMWritten on December 1817.Published in 1818 in the January 11 issue of The Examiner in

London.Frequently anthologised and probably Shelley's most famous

short poem.Written in competition with his friend Horace Smith, who wrote

another sonnet entitled "Ozymandias“.Thought to be inspired by the arrival of the statue of “Ramses II” in

Britain.A ‘classic’ poem which has been studied and dissected countless

times in the subject of English ever since its creation.

POEM I met a traveller from an antique land

Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stoneStand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,

Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frownAnd wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold commandTell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.

And on the pedestal these words appear:"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"Nothing beside remains. Round the decayOf that colossal wreck, boundless and bareThe lone and level sands stretch far away

SUMMARY The speaker recalls having met a traveller from an ancient land who told him a story about the ruins of a statue in the desert of his native country. The traveller said that two vast legs of stone stand without a body and near this, a massive crumbling and broken stone-head lies, which is half sunk in the sand. The statue has a bitter and cruel expression of ‘sneer and cold command’ and this indicates that the sculptor had understood the passions of his subject really well. It was obvious that the statue was of a man who sneered with contempt for those who were weaker than himself, yet fed his people because of something in his heart.

SUMMARY On the pedestal near the face, the traveler reads an inscription in which the ruler Ozymandias tells anyone who might happen to pass by, basically, “Look around and see how awesome I am!” But there is no other evidence of his awesomeness in the vicinity of his giant, broken statue. There is just a lot of sand, as far as the eye can see. The traveler ends his story.

THEME OF THE POEM The Poem mainly consists of 4 different themes:-Theme of Art and CultureTheme of PrideTheme of Man and the Natural WorldTheme of Transience

THEME OF ART AND CULTURE "Ozymandias" was inspired by a statue, and it's no surprise that art is one of this poem's themes. The traveler makes a point of telling us that the statue was made by a really skilled sculptor, and the poem as a whole explores the question of art's longevity. The statue is in part a stand-in or substitute for all kinds of art (painting, poetry, etc.), and the poem asks us to think not just about sculpture, but about the fate of other arts as well.

THEME OF PRIDE In the inscription on the pedestal Ozymandias calls himself the "king of kings" while also implying that his "works" – works of art like the statue, pyramids, that sort of thing – are the best around (10). Ozymandias thinks pretty highly of himself and of what he's achieved, both politically and artistically. The fact that he commissions this "colossal" statue with "vast legs" points to his sense of pride, while the statue's fragmentary state indicates the emptiness (at least in the long term) of Ozymandias’s boast.

THEME OF MAN AND NATURAL WORLD "Ozymandias" describes a statue, and statues are made from rocks and stones found in nature. While the poem explores the way in which art necessarily involves some kind of engagement with the natural world, it also thinks about how nature might fight back. The statue's head is half-buried in the sand, after all, and we are left wondering what role the erosive force of dust storms, wind, and rain played in its destruction.

THEME OF TRANSIENCE "Ozymandias" is obsessed with transience; the very fact that the statue is a "colossal wreck" (13) says loudly and clearly that some things just don't last forever. But the poem isn't just about how really big statues eventually succumb to the ravages of time; the statue is a symbol of Ozymandias's ambition, pride, and absolute power, and thus the poem also implies that kingdoms and political regimes will eventually crumble, leaving no trace of their existence except, perhaps, pathetic statues that no longer even have torsos.

UNDERSTANDING THE TITLE

"Ozymandias" is an ancient Greek name for Ramses II of Egypt. It is actually a Greek version of the Egyptian phrase "User-maat-Re," one of Ramses's

Egyptian names. Why not just call the poem "User-maat-Re," you might ask? Well, this is Shelley, who had studied ancient Greek; it is therefore no surprise

that he chooses to use the Greek name "Ozymandias," rather than the Egyptian name.

Ramses II was one of Egypt's greatest pharaohs, and many of the most famous tourist sites in Egypt, including the temple of Abu Simbel and the

Ramesseum in Thebes, were built or planned during his incredibly long tenure (he lived until he was 90!). He is known not only for his building program, but also for several ambitious foreign military campaigns and for his diplomacy,

especially with the Hittites, another important ancient people.

SETTING OF THE POEMThis poem has several settings. It begins with a strange encounter between the

speaker and a traveler from an "antique land". We have no idea where this rendezvous takes place, which is very weird. It could be in the speaker's head, in

a dream, on the street, or in the desert; it sort of resembles something that might occur in a youth hostel or a tavern in London. The first appearance of

Aragorn in the Fellowship of the Ring might be a good comparison.

Shortly after this initial meeting we are whisked away to the sands of Egypt, or a barren desert that closely resembles it. And this desert isn't just barren; it's

really barren. Other than the legs, pedestal, and head of the statue, there's only sand. No trace remains of the civilization or culture that spawned the statue. It's a lot like something you'd see in Planet Earth: emptiness all around, a few sand-

storms here, and that's about it. It reminds us of movies where people are stranded in the desert and eventually find a little oasis or the occasional tree, except that here we find a partially destroyed statue instead of a little pond.

OZYMANDIAS TRIVIANapoleon tried to steal the statue that inspired "Ozymandias" and left a hole in its right sideShelley was part of a larger group of friends that frequently engaged in sonnet-writing contests. The members included Leigh Hunt and John Keats. Shelley used the pseudonym (fake name) "Gilrastes" when he published "Ozymandias" in the Examiner. Shelley's body is buried in Rome but his heart is buried in England. The graphic novel and movie Watchmen features a superhero named Ozymandias.