The OTHER Ozymandias
Tonehound
MemberFacehuggerMay-13-2017 9:52 PMHorace Smith's "Ozymandias"
In Egypt's sandy silence, all alone,
Stands a gigantic Leg, which far off throws
The only shadow that the Desert knows:—
"I am great OZYMANDIAS," saith the stone,
"The King of Kings; this mighty City shows
"The wonders of my hand."— The City's gone,—
Nought but the Leg remaining to disclose
The site of this forgotten Babylon.
We wonder,—and some Hunter may express
Wonder like ours, when thro' the wilderness
Where London stood, holding the Wolf in chace,
He meets some fragment huge, and stops to guess
What powerful but unrecorded race
Once dwelt in that annihilated place.
* Horace Smith, published his sonnet a month after Percy Shelley's. It takes the same subject, tells the same story, and makes a similar moral point, but one related more directly to modernity, ending by imagining a hunter of the future looking in wonder on the ruins of an annihilated London. Shelley wrote the poem in competition with his friend Smith, as they would regularly do.
Interesting. All re. Rameses II
Shelley + Smith > David + Walter …
Tonehound
MemberFacehuggerMay-13-2017 10:05 PMYes. I just happened to stumble onto it accidentally. Totally random and AFAIK, not mentioned previously. I'm looking into the Rameses II connection atm.
I won't give anything away, but this poem/sonnet has a very strange twist to it towards the end of the movie. Very odd …
Blackwinter-witch
MemberPraetorianMay-13-2017 10:07 PMI am familiar with the 'first' version, but I like this one Better!
IN SPACE THERE IS NO WARNING
Tonehound
MemberFacehuggerMay-13-2017 10:54 PMYes. The full poem was posted last week, I think, but when I came across it again on Wikipedia I noticed the 2nd. And yes. I too prefer Smith's version also BWW. Though I can see why they have used Shelly's as it is more darker and better suited to the scene and movie.
Tonehound
MemberFacehuggerMay-15-2017 5:05 PMHave found an explanation for the Byron reference that was mentioned, but I'm having trouble posting it for some reason … :/
Tonehound
MemberFacehuggerMay-15-2017 5:08 PMShelley - Byron "Ozymandias" connection
"By depicting that colossus decapitated and in ruins, Shelley, who felt dwarfed by the genius and celebrity of Byron, prophesies the day when the sun would finally set on the literary empire of the poet whom he despaired of rivaling."
BigDave
MemberDeaconMay-15-2017 5:45 PMNice Find... indeed touches upon the Themes in Alien Covenant and Prometheus... about how all Civilizations will Fall, one day its inevitable.
And after the Fall of these Races and their Civilizations once many many years pass all that remains is the ruins of their cities and Monuments.
Imagine if Mankind was not spread far accross our Earth, and 4000 years ago was only centered around the Area of the Red Sea and Holy Land, and so Mankind was confined to the areas in and around where this Map is.
Imagine then at around the time of Rameses II around 3200 years ago... a Virus had Spread throughout the World and infected everyone who eventually dies... all Life too..
Then all that would be left on Earth of any evidence that Earth had Life and Civilization would be scenes like this.
R.I.P Sox 01/01/2006 - 11/10/2017
