3. Percy B. Shelley

Exotism and Power in "Ozymandias"

1. Introduction

"Ozymandias" is at first glance a poem that describes the condition in which the statue of Younger Memnom was found after European colonialists arrived in Egypt. However, the whole poem is a metaphor of the ephemeral nature of power and a ironic criticism of vain, tyrannical rulers. Its three final lines are among my favourite poetry verses ever. Besides the central theme of power, for this paper I chose to focus also on the increasing curiosity towards Orient that followed Napoleon’s failed expedition.

2. About the Poet

Percy Bysshe Shelley was born in August 4, 1792, in Field Place, Horsham, England. Son of a wealthy family, he entered Eton College when he was twelve years old. In Eton, he was often bullied and he sought refuge in books. Shelley was adept in Latin and Greek and attracted to Gothic literature. In 1810 he enrolled at Oxford but didn’t attend many lectures as he was more interested in reading and discussing revolutionary ideals. Those beliefs were reflected in the pamphlet "The Necessity of Atheism", which was the cause of his expulsion few months later. Shelley refused to apology and was ostracized by his father.

Shelley eloped to Scotland with Harriet Westbrook, a 16-year-old schoolgirl he had met few months before. There, they got married and returned to England, though he spent the following months in Ireland, where he participated in political acts in favour of Ireland’s independence. Back in England, he started to visit the philosopher William Godwin’s home and bookshop. His relationship with Harriet wasn’t good and in 1814 he ran away with Godwin’s daughter, Mary, with whom he had fallen in love, leaving his pregnant wife and child behind.

Shelley, Mary and her sister Jane Clairmont travelled to France, Switzerland and Geneva, where they met fellow poet Byron and doctor John Polidori. Shelley found inspiration in the long conversations he had with Byron in Lake Geneva. It was in Byron’s house that the competition in which Mary’s Frankenstein was born took place. Having paid his debts thanks to his grandfather’s inheritance, the Shelley’s moved back to England in 1815. The next year several events took place: their second child was born and Mary’s sister and Harriet committed suicide, which allowed Shelley and Mary to get married in 1818.

The Shelley’s set for Italy in the same year, but tragedy struck again with the death of their two children. Their third child, Percy, was born a year later. When they moved to Pisa in 1820, Shelley contacted Byron and other intellectuals who inspired him to write "Prometheus Unbound" and "The Cenci". Mary spent most of her time writing and Shelley liked to sail in his boat, "Don Juan", which sank during a violent storm on July 8, 1822. Shelley’s body was found several days later. After his death, Mary collected and edited his works.

3. Exotism and Power in Romanticism

One of the main characteristics of the Romantic period was a newfound love for exoticism. Longing for a distant past, Romantic poets became fascinated by Orient, always depicted as a remote land full of adventures and different colors and traditions. Stories such as the "Arabian Nights" and the "Persian Tales" helped to fuel these appealing ideas of the West.

The nineteenth century was the age of colonialism and many explorers travelled to exotic places such as Egypt to uncover the secrets of their civilizations. The starting point for modern Egyptology was Napoleon’s unsuccessful attempt to conquer Egypt. Napoleon intended to occupy Egypt and Syria so that Britain’s communications with India became more difficult. His Egyptian Campaign, which lasted only three years (1798-1801) provided many materials with information about this country: "Description de L’Egypte", a series of publications first published in 1809, and "Voyage dans la Basse et la Haute Egypte", translated into English in 1803. The most important discovery was the Rosetta Stone, a stele that contains much information that made possible the understanding of Egyptian hieroglyphs.

The British museum acquired several pieces of Egyptian architecture purchased from European adventurers. The Younger Memnon statue, which is the central object of this poem, and which Napoleon had tried to transport, causing a hole on its torso. The statue was acquired by the Italian adventurer Giovanni Belzoni in 1815 using hydraulic and engineering techniques.

Shelley’s poem was the result of a competition against his friend Horace Smith. Even though the statue had not yet arrived to Britain, it was well-known in Europe and its imminent arrival inspired this poetical contest. Shelley’s poem was published first, and Smith’s poem followed one month later.

The other important theme in the poem is the arrogance and transience of power. The Younger Memnom is a statue erected to honor the pharaoh Ramses II, the most powerful Egyptian ruler, also known as Ramses the Great (1302-1213 BC). Ramses II, called Ozymandias in Greece, had a very pompous personality and went so far as to replace other pharaoh’s names on monuments for his own. His vanity brought him to erect many monuments on his honor, including the extraordinary temple Abu Simbel temples. He wanted his fame to last for eternity, but all that is left now are ruins. This contrast is used by Shelley, a revolutionary, against political tyranny.

4. Style

"Ozymandias" is a very particular sonnet. It doesn’t abide to the rules of neither the English nor the Petrarchan sonnet, in fact, Shelley’s poem only shares with them the characteristic of being fourteen lines long. Many lines don’t follow the iambic pentameter pattern typical of sonnets, instead it combines groups of iambs with groups of trochees as in line seven:

Which yet survive, stamp’d on these lifeless things,

This line follows the pattern iamb-iamb-trochee-iamb-iamb, which makes the reading of "Ozymandias" very unique. Moreover, it does not follow the rhyme scheme of the conventional sonnets, alternatively it follows the scheme ABABACDCEDEFEF, which connects the octave and sestet of the poem, otherwise clearly divided in a typical sonnet .

The two most outstanding rhetorical devices used in the poem are the metaphor of ephemeral power and the irony behind the words written in the pedestal.

5. Summary

"Ozymandias" tells the story of the decline of a grand civilization ruled by a vain king. The speaker meets a traveler from an antique land that describes to him a colossal statue, the pieces of which are broken and scattered on the ground. On the pedestal, the ancient king boasts about his power, long gone now.

6. Analysis

This poem has three narrative voices: the speaker’s, the traveler’s and the king’s. The speaker only appears directly in the first two lines of the poem, as an introduction to the traveler’s story. The aim of this layering is to increase the distance between the reader and the king, to make his reign seem more distant.

The traveler’s voice appears in the second half of the second line, he has come across the speaker and narrates him the story. First, he describes the statue as "two vast and trunkless legs of stone" that "stand in the desert" (2-3). Near them, there’s the head of the owner, "half sunk" on the sand, "a shatter’d visage" (4). Even though the head of the statue is broken, its face is still visible and his expression is vain, a "frown and wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command" (4-5). The sculptor captured his features and personality so well that they still "survive, stamped on these lifeless things" (7). But the pharaoh wasn’t completely ruthless because behind his cold expression and "the hand that mocked them" was "the heart that fed" and cared for his people (8).

Finally, the speaker mentions a pedestal and the words written on it: "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: / Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!" (10-11). This is the third narrative voice, that of Ramses the Great, telling anyone who passes by to admire everything built during his ruling. However, the pharaoh was defeated by time and now his pride and arrogance seem ironic as everything, included his own statue, is destroyed and half buried in the desert. The poem ends with a powerful statement: "Nothing beside remains. Round the decay / of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare / the lone and level sands stretch far away".

7. Conclusion

Many ambitious rulers have boasted about his power by erecting big temples, statues or large murals with their faces: Ramses the Great in ancient Egypt, whose statue was taken by the British; Saddam Hussein in Iraq, whose statue was pulled down by U.S. troops; or former North Korean dictator Kim Il Sung, who still has more than 500 statues standing tall all over the country.

Ambition and corruption have appeared in many literary works such as Faust or Shakespeare’s plays and they have always devoured their victims.