ozymandias

• "i met a traveller from an antique land"


  starts as a story, he hasn't every seen the statue only heard of it which shows it's unimportance in the modern day
• "shattered visage"


  ironic- even the most powerful person cannot control time
• "which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things"


  survive and lifeless on the same line -> art can outlast human power, but the ruined statue shows art can't immortalise power
• "king of kings"


  he is arrogant

  he is the most powerful - ulitmate ruler
• "despair!" he tells other rulers they should despair because of the size and grandeur of his "works"


  ironic -> they should despair because their power is only temporary and unimportant, like himself
• "lone and level sands stretch far away"

  alliteration (lone and level) emphasises the feeling of empty space around the desert.

  the desert is vast and can outlive a statue emphasising the insignificance of the statue ozymandias
• poem is a sonnet. does not follow a regular rhyme scheme to show that human power and structure can be destroyed
• second hand account distancing the reader even further from the kind
• the tyranny of the ruler is suggested through aggressive language

  "sneer of cold command"