OZYMANDIAS

• ~OZYMANDIAS~ (Percy Bysshe Shelley)

  Ideassss

  Shelley exposes the arrogance of mankind through ozymandias, as he believes to be omnipotent.

  Ultimately, Shelley undermines this arrogance as she believes that ultimately, man's power is ephemeral and nature is more powerful as seen through the way it has eroded the pharaoh's statue over time.
• FORM

  Written in the style of a sonnet. Typically, 14 lines and its a love poem- typically written to express your love and admiration for someone else. Shelley uses this type of form, in order to exaggerate the love and admiration that ozymandias felt towards himself. He believed to be "king of kings" showing how he thinks he is omnipotent , when in reality he isn't.

  -> Ozymandias is in love with himself, vain/ narcissistic.
• IMAGERY 1

  "My name is ozymandias, king of kings: look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!"

  • hyperbolic language to exaggerate how much power the king has. This reiterates the king's irrational idea that he has the most power as "king of kings" creates the impression that he has the most power out of all living things.
  • Ozymandias clearly thinks of himself as more powerful than God through "ye mighty" as he boats that God should acknowledge his power and be afraid of him.
  • "despair"- shows how people should be fearful of and submit to his power- shows the man's arrogance/ego/ignorance.
• IMAGERY 2

  "On the sand, half sunk, a shattered visage lies"

  • The statue has been eroded over time by harsh weather conditions i.e. wind/rain/sun.
  • The face is smashed into pieces which means the statue has become meaningless as it is unrecognisable.
  • this represents how the king's legacy has been forgotten as nobody has maintained the statue and it has been abandoned.
  • "visage"- image/arrogance - "shattered" shows time has destroyed his image/ legacy.
  • "half sunk"- time passing, shows how man's power and image fades over time
• IMAGERY 3

  "Round the decay of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare"

  • "boundless" and "bare" - use of plosive sounds with the repetition of the 'b' sound which is quite aggressive to represent the constant attack that nature has on this monument and eventually breaks it down over time.
  • "decay" and "wreck"- creates a sense of abandonment- no one has looked after the monument. This shows how the pharaoh has been forgotten over time and reiterates how his leadership was so problematic and destructive that as soon as it ceased, he was forgotten about and left no legacy behind. It reiterates that man's power is ephemeral (short lived).
  • "decay"- deteriorated, shows how the statue has been broken down by nature over time.
  • "wreck"- broken, worthless- shows how man's power fades over time to a point where we become insignificant.
• LANGUAGE

  • "Stand", "cold command","pedestal (positioned above everything else)"

  -> lexical field of power: this reiterates the arrogance of man-kind as it presents ozymandias as believing he is superior which shows his arrogance.

  • "decay", "sunk", "shattered", "wreck", "remains", "bare", "desert"

  ->semantic field of destruction-"shattered"-> irreversible- something that is very difficult to piece back together because it has been broken down into many pieces. This reiterates the ephemeral power of man-kind as over time, the statue was broken and forgotten about, and nature was responsible for this destruction; it has now become futile.
• STRUCTURE

  "My name is ozymandias..."- this is the first time that we get to hear explicitly from the pharaoh himself. This introduction appears towards the middle/ end of the poem in order to signify how unimportant the king is as if he has actual importance, he would have been introduced to us from the beginning.

  Highlights the insignificance of his power and status.