SHELLEY’S OZYMANDIAS

 

SHELLEY’S OZYMANDIAS

Percy Bysshe Shelley was an English romantic poet. He was born on 4 August 1792 and died on 8 July 1822. “Ozymandias” is the title of the sonnet which he wrote on the futility of power held by unjust kings and rulers.

This sonnet was originally published on 11 January 1818 and is still considered  one of the best English sonnets. Its message is that all power is transient, futile and ineffectual.

Ozymandias was a king of ancient Egypt. He was also called Ramesses II. His period is stated to be 1279-1213 BC.

As for holding  power,  an English clergy Caleb C Colton (1780-1832) says: Power will intoxicate the best hearts, as wine the strongest heads, No man is wise enough, not good enough, to be trusted with unlimited power.

Ozymandias was a merciless king. This was reflected in the statue which  motivated Shelley to write his sonnet which reads as follows.

                                    OZYMANDIAS

I met a traveller, from an antique land

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.    

 

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G.R. Kanwal

18 March 2024