Imagery And Diction In 'Ozymandias' By Percy Bysshe Shelley

“Ozymandias” is a Shakespearean sonnet written by the romantic poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley. It had an overall theme of how all human accomplishments and material things all eventually fade to nothing. Through the use of juxtaposition, imagery and diction, Shelley was able to clearly exemplify and demonstrate the theme through the use of these literary elements. In Mark Milnes work overview he states, “Today, Shelley 's "Ozymandias" is one of his most famous poems.”

As the major theme throughout this sonnet explains how no matter how great our undertakings may seem in our eyes, they will one day all pass away, become over and done, and go back to the state of nothingness. Nevertheless, a concurrence that is found throughout the majority of this

In this sonnet there is a lot of death. The figure represented in the statue is dead along with the civilization which he belonged. The statue is destroyed or in other words, “dead.” Besides the death, there are certain images of life that give the sonnet a sense of balance. In lines 1-2, describe an encounter between two living people, the speaker and “traveler form an antique land.” In lines 6-7, the description of the “sculptor” making a statue shows another living person into the sonnet, and so does the reference to the “passions” of Ozymandias. Even thought the sculpture was “lifeless,” the passions still

One can see the huge legs of the statue standing out. Nearby, lying sunken into the sand is the crushed face of the statue. Its expression has been left for time immemorial: frowning and wrinkled lip and sneer, representative of his rule. It is obvious that the traveler that the sculptor was able to capture the arrogance and the passion of the great ruler. The ruins still denote his power. The “hand that mock’d” is still a reference to the sculptor and the work if imitation he performs. This is an example of synecdoche, in which the “Hand” is another example of syndoche, in which the hand represents the whole of the statue. The pedestal of the statue still stands. On it is the message that Ozymandias wanted to leave for posterity. Foolishly, he thought that since he had built it that it would last forever. The sonnet uses a single metaphor: the shattered, ruined statue in the desert wasteland, with its arrogant, passionate