Ozymandias by Shelley

[Anonymous No.19346565]

I've never understood the line
>The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed
Is it the sculptor who mocks ozymandius but his heart is fed by the artistry in his work? or is it ozymandius who mocks the sculptor but whose heart is fed by the vanity of being glorified in art? Or is it neither? I'm confused.

[Anonymous No.19346595]

>>19346565
I have always read it as the hand mocking Ozymandias' contemporaries and his heart (ego) feeding on their humiliation. I read the sculptor as only incidental: he's putting all of this clear and obvious imagery into the sculpture because it was so apparent in the man himself.

Thanks for making a good thread by the way, it's been a while. Shame no one else will respond. It's not your fault.

[Anonymous No.19346603]

>>19346565
I read that as Ozymandias' relationship with his subjects; from his place of superiority, he looked down on them, while at the same time his rule was a bountiful time. He is a proud king, yes, but a truly great one as well. And still, nothing beside remains.

[Anonymous No.19346609]

>>19346565
Perhaps mocked as in, to make a copy of (the sculpture). A mock trial, as opposed to a mockery. Dual meaning perhaps as well.

[Anonymous No.19346635]

>>19346603
That's how I read it as well

"The hand that mocked them"
He mocks his subjects from a position of absolute authority

"the heart that fed"
He still ensures his subjects are fed, probably seeing himself as a paternalistic god-like figure

[Anonymous No.19346679]

>>19346565
Others already explained but to put it another way, the hand and the heart are "those passions" which the sculptor read. The subject of the poem is looking at the hand of the statue and imagining the arrogant gestures of the ruler when issuing commands to the sculptor, and likewise imputing the ruler's emotional satisfaction (heart that fed) at the obeisance of his subjects in the expression on the statue's face.

[Anonymous No.19346701]

>>19346565
>"...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"
Anons have given good interpretations already, and mine is a mix:

>the hand that mocked them
The sculptor's, who managed to capture so well the passions that moved Ozy.

>the heart that fed
Ozymandias', meaning the type of person he was is patently etched in the stone; the true man beyond the artifice.

That line tells us that both represented and representer are encased in the artwork, and no matter the artistry of one or the power of the other, they were equally forgotten.

[Anonymous No.19346714]

>>19346701
I'd like to clarify:
The heart is also what what was directly feeding the passions. I think this reading is closer to the text, since no subjects have yet been mentioned and passions have gotten ample screen time.

[Anonymous No.19346815]

>>19346609
Interesting

[Anonymouṡ No.19346819]

>>19346565
Firstly you need to know what "mock" means in this context. It doesn't mean "make fun of". It means "to simulate, to copy". This use of the word still exists in the term "mock-up", e.g. "let's make a mock-up before we build the real thing."

The whole line says:

"The sculpture shows disdain and authority and stuff, and it's so well done, it's clear the person who made it understood those emotions very well. But the statue itself has lasted longer than the man who made it.

The "hand that mocked" is the ARTIST'S hand which made the statue which simulates those emotions.

The "heart that fed" is the heart of the actual subject, the king (Ozymandius himself).

[Anonymous No.19346821]

>>19346679
this is what I had always read as, and also the most literal interpretation. never thought too deep into this one, but definitely a lot of valid readings here

[Anonymouṡ No.19346824]

>>19346819
Sorry, I should say, the statue has lasted longer than the man who made it AND the subject himself.

[Anonymous No.19346840]

>>19346565
Imagine failing to understand the most baby tier poem in the english language. Like, even The Tiger has a deeper degree of poetic sublimity. It's like going to /mu/ asking what was WAP about, or imploring /tv/ to explain latest Avengers. Absolutely embarrassing. Please never procreate, for the betterment of the human race it's important that you shall be the terminus of your shameful lineage. Never reply to me, I don't converse with proles.

[Anonymous No.19346844]

>>19346840
My favorite poem is Ash Wednesday. What's your opinion of me?

[Anonymous No.19346873]

>>19346840
Shut your fucking mouth you poseur pseud or I'll give be you such a lashing that you will regret your belligerent little post—in this life and the next.

[Anonymous No.19346955]

>>19346819
Aw shit you must be right about that. But then I don't quite follow the grammar to understand "the heart that fed" if that part refers to Ozymandias. I'd have to guess the sculptor's heart fed off the passions just in the sense of understanding them as an artist.

[Anonymous No.19346977]

The character of Ozymandias as captured by the sculptor "yet survives" in its present form as described by the poet.

[Anonymouṡ No.19347049]

>>19346955

...its sculptor well those those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on those lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed

The passions, stamped on those lifeless things [the stone], survive [i.e. outlast] the artist [the hand that mocked them] and the subject [the heart that fed].

[Anonymouṡ No.19347077]

>>19346955
Shelly is using a lot of "poetic" inversions of word order, which is especially confusing these days since people are much less used to them.

Let's just take the words of the poem and put them into the natural order of speech, so the meaning is clear.

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said:

“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert.
Near them, on the sand, lies
a shattered, Half-sunk visage,

Whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor read well those passions
Which, stamped on these lifeless things, yet survive 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,
The lone and level sands, boundless and bare, stretch far away.

---


Now just remember that "yet" means "still", and there you are.

[Anonymous No.19347083]

>>19346840
>(you)

[Anonymous No.19347298]

OP here. I've read all for your posts. Even though i haven't set on an interpretation yet, you've all given me quite a bit to think about. I feel i have a much better appreciation for the poem now thanks to you all. It's threads like these that remind me why i still love this board despite everything else. Thank you.
I'm not going to mass reply to all of you, but know that each and every one of you have a special (you) in my heart.

[Anonymous No.19347311]

>>19346819
Damn, that makes much more sense than my interpretation. So it's saying the statue outlived both the sculptor and Ozymandias' passions that he captured in the statue. Nice.

[Anonymous No.19347315]

The following reply was generated automatically by an AI using OpenAI’s GPT-3

“ It’s the sculptor who mocks Ozymandius, his heart being fed by the fact that what he has done is simply magnificent . His ability to make something magnificent out of nothing is what Ozymandius can’t stand. The sculptor only gains the pleasure of satisfaction, whereas Ozymandius is subjected to the pain of defeat.

“It seemed as though the whole house and all the arts and sciences were banded together to deceive me, to lead me away from the truth, from reality, from the truth about reality. …They all wanted to make me believe I could know the truth about the truth, about Ozymandius. It’s all a trap! It’s all a trap!”

And yes, the sculptor is your typical prof. The sculptor is a professor who wants to know Ozymandius’s opinion about a sculpture–not a good relationship between a scholar and a subject. Ozymandius probably doesn’t care that much about the sculpture, either.”

[Anonymous No.19347349]

>>19346955
>feed off
I think that is wrong. Lose the “off” and its meaning is superior.
Pretty sure “them” refers to “passions”.
So the sculptor’s hands mocked the passions Onto the statue, while Ozymandias’ heart fed those passions themselves (for the sculptor then to read them well).

[Anonymous No.19347358]

Literature is being discussed on /lit/

[Anonymous No.19347359]

>>19347349
>*fed

[Anonymous No.19347390]

I have not studied literature and always struggle to even comprehend the structure of the sentences in poetry. Is it:

>tell that its sculptor well those passions read, which yet survive. Stamped on these lifeless things....

or

>tell that its sculptor well those passions read. Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things...

How do I get better at poetry comprehension? Are there rules and techniques I'm not aware of? Inb4 kill yourself midwit etc

[Anonymous No.19347394]

>>19346565
it means 'be yourself'

[Anonymous No.19347413]

>>19346819
This is correct but the mocking here is intentionally derisive.

[Anonymous No.19347430]

>>19346840
This is probably bait, but everyone who gets into poetry has to start with the basics

[Anonymous No.19347433]

>>19347390
Neither, the sense is carried on through the entirety of both lines:

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read / Which [i.e. the passions] yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things

The lines add a pauses in the thought but the thought is continued in the next line, and it's not just the equivalent of a comma because line breaks are significant in a different way, the end of a line can emphasise something that a comma can't. Here it draws attention to "passions read". If you try to write this poem as prose, it looks like a big run-on sentence, but poetry works differently.

[Anonymous No.19347464]

>>19347413
There's no reason to assume that, nothing in the poem indicates that the sculptor wanted to make fun of Ozzy. The verse
>The hand that mocked them, and the heart thst fed
Merely states that the ruins survived the people which creates them - the sculptor's hands, and the ruler whose cruel heart fed the sculptor with inspiration.

[Anonymous No.19347498]

>>19346565
>Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
the sculptor put ozymandias' personality described in previous lines into the sculpture

>Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things
The physical ozymandias is dead; the lifeless statue remains - and of the statue all we can read is these passions aforementioned - the physical (living) ozymandias is erased and now (and implied, always) consists of only these passions.

>the hand hat mocked them, and the hear tthat fed:
sculptor (hand) mocked (sculpted) and mocked (made fun of, ironic) the aforementioned passions through the sculpture
heart that fed reminds us that ozymandias was a person once in contrast to my previous comment, and draws contrast with descriptions in lines 4 and 5

Essentially; whilst Ozymandias is implied to be human when it was created (like the sculptor, we presume) his only remaining visage is a big grumpy statue in the middle of nowhere. He is mocked by his own presentation of himself, that he thought he would be eternal, and the irony that he is in a sense eternal now but for all the wrong reasons.

>ye Mighty
the man was challenging god, which again hints at the contrast between human/god mortal/immortal themes in the poem, and the fact that the human/mortal is dead, the statue which is lifeless and still not immortal, and then god which presumably is.

[Anonymous No.19347508]

>>19347464
it doesn't imply that the sculptor intended, with these depictions, to make fun of him

but it is implied in the double-meaning of the word in the description of the narrator and the context of the poem that, in its current context, this is now the case.

[Anonymous No.19347549]

>>19347498
The point i try to communicate here is perhaps best summed as:

It is impossible for the audience to separate the description of the statue of Ozymandias from the imagined physical Ozymandias who created it - King of kings in his own description, the audience can never envisage him as anything more than a snarling decrepit statue in the desert
His legacy is just that, this is the first the author hears of the subject Ozymandias and presumably the last as that is all the information that exists on the subject.

When you read the poem and think Ozymandias king of kings, there is nothing to furnish that image beyond your own imagination (no description of his grandeur, accomplishments, etc), and the exercise would be redundant with the knowledge that [lines 2-14], particularly [lines 12-14].

The poem mocks the very central idea of Ozymandias; nothing lasts forever.

[Anonymous No.19347570]

>>19347549
Additionally, the irony that Ozymandias' immortal legacy is now a poem based on a description from a nobody from nowhere about how nothing but his shitty personality is all you can discern from a broken statue, in juxtaposition to his(Ozymandias') intention of a grand imposing statue meant to strike despair into gods.

[Anonymous No.19347589]

Virgin interpretation
>p-p-power is impermanent i-in the end its all d-dust...
Chad interpretation
>Ozymandias built a cool fucking statue that continues to strike fear into normies hearts centuries hence

[Anonymous No.19347602]

>>19347589
>Chad interpretation
>>Ozymandias built a cool fucking statue that continues to strike fear into normies hearts centuries hence

Chad gets scared of a crumbly statue in a desert?
poor interpretation

[Anonymous No.19347609]

>>19346565
The god-king held his subjects in contempt as they paled before his majesty (the hand that mocked them) but at the same time, he provided for his people (the heart that fed). It is clear that Shelley refers to the statues made in the likeness of Ozymendias

[Anonymous No.19347743]

>>19347433

Thanks, anon. I guess it takes practice