Shelley's "Ozymandias"

Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,

Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown

And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command

Tell 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 decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,

The lone and level sands stretch far away.

"Ozymandias" is one of Shelley's most celebrated sonnets. It is a fourteen-line poem metered in iambic pentameter.Ozymandias is traced to King Rameses II of Egypt who lived at about 1322. He subjugated the Hitties and married their princess. The ruler conquered Ethiopia and established a fleet on the Mediterranean. The theme of the poem is the transience of power and the ephemeral nature of materialism. The poet juxtaposes past memories of magnificence with the present ruins of the King's statue. All the achievements have come to naught as the barren desert foregrounds the colossal wreck as a silhouette against the pale background.

The speaker in the poem encounters a stranger in the course of his journey to an ancient land that is most likely Egypt. The stranger points out to the speaker a pair of legs of stone lying unobtrusively about in the deserts. The legs are separated from the huge body of the statue of Ozymandias. It signifies that the very base is missing. The body is missing, and a broke face is visible, connoting the lack of identity. As the face lay half-buried, the sand, it echoed the disparaging stance of the king towards his subjects. The sculptor captured perfectly the Mephistophelean expression of the king through his frown and wrinkled lips. It mirrored his disdain for the people and his lack of sensitivity. The expression is still alive on the face of the statue, though the person is forgotten. Shelley highlights that as a person dies, his negative aspects are more counted against his achievements.

The sculptor ironically seems to have made a ridicule of the King rather than eulogizing him through his sculpture. The king strived for political glory throughout his life and challenged even the Gods with the words inscribed on his pedestal.

"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"

The lines underline the egotism and authority of the King that is reduced to nihilism in the face of the hollowness of life and the inevitability of death. Shelley was always in opposition to despotic rule and hailed the French revolution. The "lone and level" sands that stretch far away point to the infertile life that is only fruitful in worldly pursuits.