I may be offered a paying-gig working on a text to introduce high-school students to some canonical (public domain) poems in the "Common Core Curriculum." Since I hated poetry in high-school (largely because of the way it's taught), I find writing a "sample essay" to be a daunting task--especially as I try to simplify my grad-school theory-speak, but I need a job....so it's worth a shot. Here's one of my first attempts to speak to high school students in writing.
Percy Byshh Shelley,
“Ozymandias”-- Reading And Commentary
I. A Public Sonnet
Shelley’s poem, like Shakespeare’s is also a sonnet, but it’s closer in form to a Petrarchan sonnet than a Shakesperean
sonnet; though it modifies the form. The first has 5 lines, and the final three
have three lines. The rhyme scheme is ABABA/CDC/EDE FEF (though “appear and
despair” are an off rhyme). In contrast to both Shakespeare and Donne’s “Valediction,”
“Ozymandias,” is not addressed to a lover (or even a failed lover like Donne’s
“Song”), but to no one in particular (or to everyone—the general reader). It is
a more blatantly public poem.
II. The Question of
Interpretation
When you read a poem as strange as “Ozymandias,” you will
probably have questions. That’s why people read poetry criticism, or
interpretations of poetry. It’s a good thing to hear what other people have to
say---your teachers, a book, a website, or even this APP. But one of the first
things you’ll notice is that almost everyone has a different interpretation of the poem---even if
they all like it and think it’s worthy of talking, or writing, about. A poem
like “Ozymandias” encourages these different interpretations and disagreements;
that’s part of what makes it a great poem.
While it’s a good thing to listen to what others have to say, the best
all of us can do is to help you form your own informed opinion about what the poem really means, or can mean to you. As you organize your thoughts, and
write your own papers. It’s a good thing to be a little skeptical of what any
“authority” says.
When I first read “Ozymandias,” I was told what many are
told: Its central theme is “the
inevitable decline of all leaders, and of the empires they build, however
mighty in their own time.” This is what Wikipedia, and many critics and
teachers, boldly state, and it’s a useful starting point for your own
interpretation, but it’s important to question this authority. Other
authorities disagree. You may either agree or disagree with that statement, but
it’s good to look at all the evidence
in the poem to test this statement out in order to “back up” (support) your own
interpretation.
III. Historical
Context: The Title of the Poem, and the Other Ozymandias Poem
The name
“Ozymandias”
may first strike us as a strange: foreboding,
and a little scary--certainly scarier than the name of the actual historical
king it apparently refers to: the Egyptian Pharoah, Ramesses’ II (1303 BC—1213
BC). Shelley did not come up with the name, nor was he the only one to use it
as a title for a poem. The word “Ozymandias,” is a Greek transliteration of the
name of his
throne. And Shelley’s
poem includes a paraphrases of the inscription on the base of the statue, from
Diodorus Sicilus’s Greek
Bibliotheca
historica, as "King of Kings am I, Osymandias. If anyone would
know how great I am and where I lie, let him surpass one of my works."
Looking at these two historical facts, and their inclusion
in Shelley’s poem, it’s understandable that many would conclude that the poem is
primarily about Ramesses II, but Shelley took this theme as a starting point,
and did something very different with it. In 1818, he undertook a gentlemanly
contest with his friend, the poet Horace Smith; they both wrote “Oyzmandias”
sonnets. Since both have been published (and can be found on the web),
comparing and contrasting the two of them can help illuminate exactly what
Shelley was up to in his poem.
Smith’s sonnet lost the competition; it’s not as famous as
Shelley’s poem, and is certainly not nearly as interesting. It is, however,
much simpler, and easier to understand on one or two readings (in contrast to
Shelley’s which takes a few readings to digest, and gains in complexity the
more you read it). So some may prefer it. In fact if you’re looking for a poem
whose central theme is “the
inevitable decline of all leaders, and of the empires they build, however
mighty in their own time,” you’ll probably like Horace Smith’s sonnet better.
Here’s an excerpt of Smith’s poem, which spell out this
“central theme:”
"I am great OZYMANDIAS," saith the
stone,
"The King of Kings; this mighty City
shows
"The wonders of my hand."— The City's
gone,—
Smith concludes by wondering if London, and the mighty
British Empire, will meet the same fate.
[i]
Smith’s poem is formally much stiffer and more conventional, and much more
didactic than Shelley’s. He makes his point, with maybe one interesting
metaphor, but that’s about it. While there are certainly similarities between
Smith’s “Ozymandias” and Shelley’s, there are many more differences—even in the
way they quote (or misquote) what is written on the stone. Shelley’s poem makes
no mention of “this mighty city”—nor of London, and no blatant didactic point
about the inevitable decline of all civilizations; instead, he focuses much
more on the stone, and even on the artist who sculpted it.
IV. Shelley’s Octet
Shelley’s “Ozymandias” starts as a story-poem, a narrative,
but it’s not even spoken by the author. It's spoken by a traveller from “an
antique land” (perhaps Lord Byron) who talks about what he sees on his travels.
The use of the word “antique,” rather than “ancient” is interesting. People
don’t normally speak of lands, or civilizations, as antique, they speak of art as antiques. This simple, and
subtle, word choice foreshadows what happens next.
As this traveller recounts his trip, he only talks about the
fragments of an artwork he finds. First, we see “Two vast and trunkless legs of
stone” standing in the desert. It’s certainly a more striking image than
Smith’s “gigantic leg,’ but in addition to the legs, this traveller finds
something that is entirely absent in Smith’s poem: “Near them, on the sand/
half sunk, a shattered visage.” This composite image sounds like some 20th
century art, like De Chirico, for instance. As he looks at it, he’s more like an
art-critic than a storyteller, and he praises the sculptor’s art. The visage’s
“frown,/And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,/ Tell that its sculptor
well those passions read/ Which yet survive…”
It’s not even absolutely clear to this traveller/art-critic,
or to Shelley himself, that these are pieces of the same work. “The passions which yet survive” are
apparently very mean, cruel, and heartless—if we judge by the facial expression
(which certainly tells no “flowery tale” like Keats’ Grecian Urn). It’s not a
mere “talking head;” there are legs, but the fragmented remains of the
sculpture do not include a trunk, a heart, or hand. The traveller, however, is
able to imagine “the hand that mocked
them and the heart that fed.” In short, he feels the life the sculptor’s own “trunk” could breathe or ‘stamp’ onto these
‘lifeless things.’ The word ‘mocks’ is interesting; in Shakespeare’s day (200
years earlier), it primarily meant “to imitate,” but by Shelley’s day, it had
also come to mean what it primarily means today, “to scorn” or “make fun of.”
This double meaning allows Shelley a very suggestive ambiguity, which deepens the
poem’s mystery, and leaves more room for our debate and interpretations.
We have now reached the end of the sonnet’s octet, its first “half,” and there’s
still no direct mention of what allegedly is supposed to be its “central
theme,” but we have a much more emotionally-charged image of the sculpture’s
“visage.” Many more passions appear to survive through this art than in Smith’s
poem.
V. Shelley’s Sestet
In the first tercet of the sonnet’s sestet, the poem finally moves to the
inscription on the sculpture:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Like Sicilius’s Greek translation, this inscription uses the
word “works” (rather than Smith’s more specific line about the “mighty City”).
In Shelley’s version, Ozymandias asks us to “Look on” his works. The challenge
to “surpass” these works is implicit, however, as he (Ozymandias) asks the
mighty to despair in what he assumes will be our failure. The egomania of this
inscription is heightened much more in Shelley’s version than in Smith’s, and
it provides a perfect “caption” (or graphic novel ‘word balloon’) to go with
the image the octet presented of the visage’s “”sneer of cold command.”
But what are these works? And do they make us despair? The
only “work” we can see in the poem is what yet survives of the artwork. In
Shelley’s poem, we know nothing about whether the king was a good governor, or
any of his other works, but we do know more about the sculpture, and even the
sculptor.
Judging by the poem itself, it sounds as if the unnamed
sculptor is referring to himself in this description: bragging about his art.
Is it even possible that this could have been the sculptor’s self-portrait?
After all, Ozymandias was the “throne
name” of Ramesses II, which is not quite the same thing as Ramesses’ own
name; and the bragging boast of the inscription suggests an artist so
over-confident in his importance that he would chose himself as his subject.
Regardless of who is speaking it, the last tercet (still spoken by the traveller) implies
that this is a ridiculous attitude. We don’t know what this sculpture, in all
of its original glory, did, and we can read historical accounts of Ancient
Egypt, but even if we can assume that it was a more complete portrayal of the
complexity of the man---his warmth, tenderness, and well-rounded character (or
even his muscular trunk)---the sculpture, like the city, is still a castle made
of sand (As Jimi Hendrix poignantly put it). It’s easy to see the irony, and
the hubris, here.
As Katy Waldman puts it in a recent article about the TV
Show
Breaking Bad (which quoted from
Shelley’s poem), “given Shelley’s anti-imperial leanings, the scornful takeaway
seems obvious:
So much for all that arrogant posturing. Joke’s on you, Oz!
Can I call you Oz? Who cares! You’re just some rubble in the desert.
This decayed “colossal wreck” may indeed make us despair,
but not with its greatness. If that’s the point of this poem, it’s an ironic
commentary (or mocking) of both the sculptor and the emperor. Or it’s a
warning, a cautionary tale, a lesson in humility. In a way, Shelley is telling
himself to avoid his own temptations to be arrogant through his artistic
powers---it’s an easy temptation, especially from the landed class as Shelley
was, and had many flatterers. This may explain why Shelley himself puts the
entire poem in quotes: he’s trying to be self-effacing. To acknowledge
mortality in which “nothing beside remains;” to “admit absence” as Donne puts
it, and the possible “colossal wreck” of his own art and life
For Katy Waldman, however, here’s “the real irony.”
of the poem:
“ Ramses II has not, actually, been forgotten. Nor was his
ghost receding in Shelley’s time: The ancient Egyptians fascinated Napoleon,
who brought archeologist-historians with him when he invaded Egypt in 1798, and
Lord Byron, whose journals are littered with speculation about long-dead
civilizations. And while the 18th-century “relic” poem—of which “Ozymandias” is
an exemplar—has a memento mori, all-is-ephemeral vibe, sonnets
traditionally celebrate the perseverance of art across centuries, even across
the threshold separating life from death. So if Ozymandias and his sculptor
were not right, they weren’t entirely wrong, either.”
And yes Shelley’s poem still comes alive, whether on TV, or
in this classroom!
[i] IN
Egypt's sandy silence, all alone,
Stands a gigantic Leg, which far off
throws
The only shadow that the Desert
knows:—
"I am great OZYMANDIAS," saith the
stone,
"The King of Kings; this mighty City
shows
"The wonders of my hand."— The City's
gone,—
Nought but the Leg remaining to disclose
The site of this forgotten
Babylon.
We wonder,—and some Hunter may
express
Wonder like ours, when thro' the
wilderness
Where London stood, holding the Wolf in
chace,
He meets some fragment huge, and stops to
guess
What powerful but unrecorded
race
Once dwelt in that annihilated place.
