My favorite poem is Ozymandias by Percy Shelley.
This poem analyzes the human inferiority among time and death. The story of this traveller telling his experience to the narrator is a metaphor for man’s disadvantage against life and its course. The traveller tells “I met a traveller” (l.1) the story of a statue he saw in the desert. The inscription on the statue and the shape of the sculpture scare the reader: “Two vast and trunk less legs of stone/ Stand in the desert“(L.2), this shows how, in the past, these two legs where part of a possible great statue and men. Power could therefore, be transmitted even after the destruction of the statue itself, the reader is in fact captured and afraid of these rests of a possible monumental statue, that intrigues and incurious us.
Ozymandias, the king in honor of whom the statue was built, tries to transmit power and superiority throughout this statue, the inscription on the monument has this king’s words, which seem to be full of hubris: “"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings”. Unfortunately, all the king’s possessions were lost in with time, and the powerful Ozymandias and his statue are nothing but dust and “lifeless things”.
I was amazed by this poem, because it illustrates perfectly how man feels strong and powerful during life only for the superficial and materialistic goods possessed. As Ozymendias, we are all proud of our “works”, we are proud of them, and of what we built throughout life. But these works, after death, might remain on earth; their relative importance instead, will remain just a “wreck”. Man as Ozymendias, will therefore never be able de defeat death and time. This “king of kings” tried to remain in history, to stay alive after his death, but the course of time can only erase all his hubris and his numerous tries. Maybe not during our lives, maybe after our death, we are all on a same level, we are all dust, and our “works” remain destroyed by time on earth. This shows how miserable man is compared to everything else. Life is therefore miserable compared to death.
This poem describes well man’s position in the hierarchical rang of powers, on the bottom of this rang. Man’s desire of power and the subjective view on life illustrates as well how time destroys all the small things man cares about, things that are really small compared to the rest of nature, the universe and imagination.
Imagination plays in fact a key role in this sonnet; the poet uses a short story, with a touch of unrealistic point of view, to help the reader adopt an objective view on life. As Ozymendias, we are all meant to lose against time and death.
I agree with Ludovica on the fact that this poem analyses time and death; however, I think that the inferiority of man is not the only idea that Percy Bysshe Shelley wanted to show. In fact, Ozymandias represents Ramses II, an ancient pharaoh of Egypt. He is described as a cruel leader: "in cold command", "frown and wrinkeled lip", "the hand that mocked them". Ozymandias seems to have been a very powerful ruler by the appearance of his statue, which even broken is "colossal". I don't think that the poet wants us to be scared of Ozymandias. The statue is now only a "wreck", "half sunk" and stretches "far away". Te fact that it stretches far away increases the disatnce between the listener and Ozymandias. I think that the poet wants us to realise taht we must not have too much of a high opinion of ourself or feel superior to others because we are all human and there is always something superior to us.
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