Ozymandias by PB Shelley / Floodland

[Quiff Boy]

now then.

this poem seems to be a huge influence on the floodland lyrics (along with ts eliot's "wasteland" which we've discussed before i'm sure).

have we "done" this poem yet?

if not, then here we go...

OZYMANDIAS
by Percy Bysshe Shelley

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,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose 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.
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, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

so...

"And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,"

thats eldritch!

"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"

similar words and rhythm/metre (sp?) to dominion's chorus...

In the land of the blind
Be...king, king, king, king

"The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed."

parallels with "this corrosion"?

Why the blood run hold the highered hand
On heart
Hand Of God

"The lone and level sands stretch far away"

this corrosion quotes this almost word for word.

also, the theme of dominion: turning gold to chrome/rust, decay etc seem to reflect the ideas in Ozymandias...

and so he used the name "Ozymandias" for the "remix" of domion. nice.

clever chap, our von, isnt he?

any more thoughts or observations about this poem?

[Andy TG]

The "Ozymandias" remix of Dominion - as featured on the Dominion 12" Box set and the Boxed Cassette is simply IMHO Dominion played backwards!

I am a fan of the poem having researched it after I heard the "Ozymandias" track.

I agree with all that QB has posted and Dominion is still one of my personal fave Sisters tracks - which ever version I happen to be listening to at the time!

Knew You'd Be Pleased.....

[Big Si]

The first single I ever bought and owned

And my fave music vid of all time!

And this -



appears on this interesting site for fun - http://www.sunshocked.com/

and the real history behind what the poem is based on is here - http://www.savagenet.com/oz/Oz/real.htm

Knew you'd be pleased

[MrChris]

The poem is about arrogance, and particularly it takes a kind of wicked delight in the fact that even the most arrogant will eventually fall. The man who built the statue of himself in the desert believed his empire was eternal, but now it's nothing. You COULD work a jibe at Hussey in here, but for me it's fairly obvious that the Ozymandias figure in the song is the USA. The US believes itself invulnerable, but one day it will come a cropper, and who knows where the source of its downfall will be. Obviously, the spectre of Chernobyl (downfall comes in 'the settled dust' of nuclear destruction) gives an apocalyptic illustration of this, or so it seemed at the time. The one-eyed king would presumably be Reagan, or whoever ruled the land of the blind at the time, and hence it would be him who possessed the sneer of cold command. Apologies to those to whom all of this was obvious already. I think mapping Shelley's text onto the USA is a really neat idea.

[Silver_Owl]

You wouldn't believe the same bloke wrote Orgasm Addict would you?

[mayhem]

[quote]

You wouldn't believe the same bloke wrote Orgasm Addict would you?







I'm now trying to imagine it in a Buzzcocks style. With an optional 'don't gob at me!' thrown in.

M

[James Blast]

I went to Syria, I took a gun

[Black Dahlia]

The statue that inspired Shelley is in the Karnak Temple in Luxor. Ive actually seen it and its pretty impressive.

[khepri II]

The statue that inspired Shelley is in the Karnak Temple in Luxor. Ive actually seen it and its pretty impressive.

that's the one in the bond film isn't it

[khepri II]

IN Egypt's sandy silence, all alone,
Stands a gigantic Leg, which far off throws
The only shadow that the Desart 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.

[MrChris]

Eh? I liked that, but what was it?

[khepri II]

Diodorus Siculus (Book 1, Chapter 47)

Quiffy seems my daft idea might be right after all

king, king, king , king

[khepri II]

Eh? I liked that, but what was it?

MrC

AFAIK the assumption was Shelley. Has Von ever confirmed this?

Seems there were two written within months of each other, originally placed side by side

http://www.netsoc.ucd.ie/~tadhg/main/ozyhist.html

[Quiff Boy]

read "Death By Water" from UTR#3

http://www.myheartland.co.uk/gallery/de ... age_id=206
http://www.myheartland.co.uk/gallery/de ... age_id=207

[khepri II]

Quiffy

danke, tis a truly great resource

However, possibly I didn't explain my thought clearly?

I meant that Von may have been calling on both poems. Yeah, the "lone and level" bit is undeniable but Shelley's is a general decay of civilisation whereas Smith was much more specific. Naming London might be a link into the "streets of shame", as mentioned in 1959 and all that? I know this is negated to some extent by the fact that England was the World Power at that time, pretty much as the US is now. I just kinda get the feeling that Eldritch wasn't looking at one source in isolation?

As for the apocalyptic and biblical connotations I've discussed previously, well they're in the source material for Shelley and Smith's poems

[Quiff Boy]

I just kinda get the feeling that Eldritch wasn't looking at one source in isolation?

it wouldnt be the first time

[kafka]

now then.

this poem seems to be a huge influence on the floodland lyrics (along with ts eliot's "wasteland" which we've discussed before i'm sure).

Just to be a pedantic twit, it's "The Waste Land".. which I think has quite a different sense to it, and which furthermore hasn't been butched by The m*****n.

Cheers,
--George

[Moakahontas]

Forwards or backwards ..

..it doesn´t matter - it´s all the same..


'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, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away."



..and here we are now..here he is now.. it´s quite simple..




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

[Silver_Owl]

Was that really 6 years ago? Well done for digging it up.

[Moakahontas]

Was that really 6 years ago? Well done for digging it up.

Ooops..


It´s just.. I didn´t know that song until this morning.
I was thinking :"Hey if the record runs on Side A it´s ok, reverse it on Side B the songs from Side A must be running backwards...or something like that..

[markfiend]

I know it's The Hollow Men not The Waste Land but this seems somewhat appropriate:

This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

[Silver_Owl]

I know it's The Hollow Men not The Waste Land but this seems somewhat appropriate:

This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

[Moakahontas]

I feel it in
I should follow in

I get lost, I get lost
This is the one way in

Lost, Lost - I get lost





* the original song "Dominion/Mother Russia" backwards.

[eotunun]

Hontee's idea had me goin earlier.

So Ozymandias sounds *a lot* like Dominion in reverse. But not identical. Yet still they are A and B side of the same 7" record.

So it's like the A side spinning clockwise, the B side spinning counterclockwise but both times mostly the same song.
Only that there are fragments of different lyrics in Ozymandias.
Like
"I want in, I want in"
"It must end"
etc.

Summarizing I get the impression that A and B side serve like two sides sides of a mask.

Dominion, the A side being the official "Facade", a controlled expression while the B-Side comes across like a haze of anger and raging madness.
These being the two sides of the same record actually takes the thing a step beyond: It's a work of arts that makes up one object out of all its parts. A work of arts.
I don't know if this idea is on target, but if it is that's a piece of genius!

[Nadia81]

And this-that it's a work of genius-is a surprise to you ?