Ozymandias

Oxymandias


Percy Shelley’s sonnet “Oxymandias” is about a statue of a king named Oxymandias, in ruins spread throughout the desert. The poem uses imagery, diction and other devices to convey the scene of the desert and statue as well as give the reader an idea of what Oxymandias was like in life. Throughout the poem the reader also gains a sense of irony; If Oxymandias was as powerful as he was described, than how and why did he end up as an ignored decaying statue in the desert?
The diction in the poem is very select and communicates a desert like, dry, vast, dilapidated mood perfectly. Words such as “antique, vast, desart, survive, lifeless, remains, decay, colossal Wreck, boundless, bare, lone and level sands, and stretch far away” are examples of how the diction builds an atmosphere which engages the reader and involves them in the setting. Other diction in the poem produces imagery which commands the poem and pulls the reader deeper into the poem. For i...