Levels of Putting It All Together Theme and Point of View Using Ozymandias Foundation Lesson Levels of Read the poem below with your class, a partner, or a small group of your classmates. Think about the poem, using the activities below it to help you understand its meaning. Ozymandias I met a traveler 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. by Percy Bysshe Shelley Point of View Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply What Is the First Person Point of View? When an author chooses to use first person point of view, he or she tells the story as though the narrator were speaking directly to the reader. The narrator uses the word I as a subject and tells the story using only what he or she, the narrator, would know personally about it. This point of view has both advantages and limitations it is an intimate way of telling a story that involves readers personally and makes them more likely to believe in the story, but the narrator is limited to knowing only what goes on in the mind of one character all other characters thoughts and feelings must be suggested by the events of the plot and the narrator s observations of them. In order to interpret the poem, the reader must make some educated guesses about the person who is telling the story and his or her situation. The speaker, or narrator, of the poem may differ from the author the person writing the poem may wish to take on the persona, who is a made-up character, in the same way that a person writing a book of 41
Levels of fiction may tell the story from the first person point of view, yet not be at all like the narrator of the story. This poem is complicated in its point of view it has a frame story that surrounds the real story. One narrator introduces a second narrator the one who truly tells the story. The first narrator the one who says I met a traveler from an antique land is almost a total mystery to the reader; we know very little about this narrator, not even if it is a man or a woman. 1. What can the reader guess about the second speaker, or narrator, of Ozymandias? 2. Where has this person been? 3. Where do you think he or she is now? 4. What has he or she seen? 5. On your own paper, draw a picture of the scene the narrator describes. Strangely enough, toward the end of the poem, a third narrator appears. This is the long-dead Ozymandias himself, who speaks to the second narrator (and to the reader) through the words carved on the pedestal that once held his statue. Ozymandias, too, speaks in the first person. 6. How does the second narrator (the traveler from an antique land ) describe the face of the statue of Ozymandias? Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze 7. What inferences does the narrator make about Ozymandias from the way the face of the statue looks? 8. Write down important words, images, and details that the narrator uses to describe Ozymandias. When answering the following questions, remember that the reader can only infer the following information based on what is in the poem. We cannot know for sure; we can only make educated and informed guesses. 42
Levels of 9. What kind of a person is Ozymandias? 10. When did he live? Levels of 11. Where did he live? 12. What did he achieve? 13. How did he view his achievements? 14. How does the reader view his achievements? 15. How and why are the two perceptions different? 16. What inferences does the narrator make about the person who carved the statue? 17. How do Ozymandias s own words give the reader a sense of his character? 18. What is the effect of the poet s using multiple narrators to tell the story? 19. What is the effect of the poet having each narrator speak in the first person? 43
Levels of Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate 20. How would the poem be different had the poet used a single narrator? 21. How would it be different had the poet used third-person point of view rather than first-person point of view? Try rewriting the poem this way to gauge the effect of a change in point of view. Examine the Diction and Imagery Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply 22. With a partner, look carefully at the following words from the poem. Next to each, write down feelings and associations that are connected with the word in your own minds. a. antique land b. vast c. trunkless legs d. shattered e. visage f. wrinkled lip g. sneer h. cold command i. pedestal j. colossal k. wreck l. decay m. boundless and bare n. lone and level Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze 23. What overall feelings are created by the use of these words and images? Write down several tone words that might describe the attitude of the author toward the subject. (The subject of the poem is Ozymandias, the ancient king.) 24. The last word of the line carved on the pedestal is despair. How does the poet help the reader to see the meaning of this word in more than one way? 44
Levels of Examine the Grammar Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate Shelley uses punctuation in an interesting and complex manner in this poem. A careful reader will notice the way the poet uses punctuation to guide the reader s thoughts. Look at each sentence separately. Levels of 25. What is unusual about the first sentence? 26. What is unusual about the second sentence? 27. What is unusual about the third sentence? 28. The fourth sentence begins with two prepositional phrases. Why do you think the author chose to begin with them rather than with the subject of the sentence? 29. List the prepositional phrases in the poem (the author uses many). What would be the effect of omitting most or all of the prepositional phrases? 30. Why does the author use so many colons? 31. What is the effect of the ellipses in the first sentence? 32. Why do you think the author wrote these particular kinds of sentences in this particular order? 45
Levels of Examine the Sound Devices Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply, Create The author uses alliteration to make his words memorable, to weave phrases together, and to delight the reader with the music of language. Sometimes alliteration can be combined with consonance to create an even more complex pattern of sound. The alliterative and consonant sounds are marked for you below. I met a traveler 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. 33. Try rewriting the poem, substituting your own alliterative and consonant words and phrases for those Shelley used. Use your own paper. Search for Symbols Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze Shelley uses just one major image, the broken statue of Ozymandias, as a centerpiece for his poem. 34. What abstract quality or human characteristic might the figure of Ozymandias suggest to the reader? 35. What occurrence in human life might the disintegration of the statue suggest? 46
Levels of Look for Tone and Theme Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate 36. How do you think the traveler (the second narrator) felt when he saw the broken statue of King Ozymandias lying in the desert? Levels of 37. How do you think his feelings changed after he read the words written on the pedestal? 38. How do you think each of the following would feel if they saw the same sight? a. a modern ruler of a country b. the president of a large corporation c. a salesman who works for the company d. the commander of an army e. a private in the army 39. How would an artist perceive it? 40. The first narrator ( I met a traveler from an antique land ) feels that this story is worth relating to a wider audience. Why does he tell it to us? 41. What ironic aspects does this story have? 42. What is ironic about the fact that the poem about Ozymandias has survived for many years? The theme of a work of art is often complex and layered rather than simple and concrete. 47
Levels of 43. After reading the poem, what has the reader learned about life on each of the following levels? a. Literal: What does the poem say will happen to great statues and great rulers? b. Personal: What does the poem tell you about the durability of fame and of material wealth in your own life? c. Political: What does the poem tell you about the lasting qualities of cities, countries, governments, and their leaders? d. Moral: What does the poem suggest about human beings and their relationships to others? e. Spiritual or Universal: What does the poem suggest about human beings and their spiritual lives? Writing Practice Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply, Create 1. Write a paragraph that describes a time when you felt a sense of despair. Do not use the word despair in your paragraph, but suggest the feeling by using the image of a concrete object to symbolize it. Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply, Create 2. Write a story or narrative poem in which a person from the future discovers a remnant of our own civilization (perhaps a monument, a building, or a diary) and ponders about what America in the twenty first century must have been like. In your story or narrative poem, experiment with Shelley s technique of using multiple narrators. Timed Writing Levels of : Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate 3. Choose a book or short story you have read in which the author uses more than one narrator to tell the story. How does the use of two or more different perspectives affect the meaning of the work as a whole? 48