1. Ozymandias

2. The Big Idea: The speaker meets a ‘traveller’ who tells him of a statue made in honour of a dictator, Ozymandias which stands in the desert. The statue is now ‘half sunk’ in the sand, and the face is shattered. Much as the statue itself has not lasted, neither has the rule of the dictator.

3. Feelings Possibly relief? The rule of a dictator doesn’t last forever.
‘Sneer of cold command’ – showing the domineering, heartless rule of Ozymandias and the fear he caused his people.
Possibly relief? The rule of a dictator doesn’t last forever.
But also HUMILITY! Our own lives –and our own achievements – don’t last forever.

4. Look at my works, ye Mighty and despair
Originally meant with an air of extreme arrogance, this is now a hugely ironic line, as Ozymandias’s works have now indeed come to nothing. The statue built in his honour has all but gone, and ‘lone and level sands stretch far away’ presumably covering anything else that may have once stood there (a temple for instance).

5. Contrasts such as…. ‘vast and trunkless’
‘colossal wreck’ Showing how far Ozymandias has fallen – from great heights to nothing at all!

6. ‘lifeless things’

7. ‘Nothing beside remains’
The blunt simplicity of these lines seem to share the main message of this poem – nothing lasts forever. The fact that they’re said in such a matter of fact way emphasises that what has happened to Ozymandias – his works turning to nothing – is simple a fact of life.

8. ‘The hand that mocked them’
Is it a mockery making the statue out of stone? Even this doesn’t last.

9. Context This is a Romantic poem and as such you could comment on:
A celebration of the power of nature? The ‘lone and level sands’ have effectively buried the work of Ozymandias. We might assume we’re hugely important but human beings cease to exist; it is nature which continues.
It taps into the idea that life is transient – not permanent – which is a Romantic idea itself.