NCERT SOLUTION OF OZYMANDIAS

 a)“The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed”. Whose hand and heart has poet referred to in this line?

Answer-Through the quoted lines the poet sarcastically hinted at the sculptor who gave us the distinct expression of the tyrannous ring Ozymandias who with his proud characteristics are ruined in the desert.

b) “My name is Ozymandias, king of kings.” Why does Ozymandias refer to himself as king of kings? What quality of the king is revealed through this statement?

Answer-Ramesses II was the king from whom Shelly had got the inspiration of the character Oymandias. Out of condescending attitude, blind sense of vanity and total ignorance about the strength of time, the king Ozymandias described himself as to be king of kings.

            It shows total ignorance,  vanity and haughty foolish imagination of a king who is just a zilch in the hand of mighty time.

c) “Look on my works, ye mighty and despair!” Who is Ozymandias referring to when he speaks of “ye mighty”? Why should they despair?

Answer- Ozymandias is arrogant and goes on bragging that another kings and everybody should be awestruck for his phenomenal and incomparable works.

                                                             

 They should be hopeless and timorous because he is impossible to be defeated. Unparallel he is, for nobody can overpass the greatness and strength of him.

d) ‘Bring out the irony in the poem.

Answer-The decimated physique of Ozymandias on the desert with the bragging inscription shows the completion of the irony of Ozymandias. His thought of immortalizing himself by statues and monuments had turned futile. He is mere subject to decay, decline and death in the hand of almighty time. His swanking demand ruined in the hand of time exposes Irony.

e) ‘Nothing beside remains’. What does the narrator mean when he says these words?

Answer-The narrator comments ‘Nothing beside remains’ on the present situation around the ruined statue of the king Ozymandias. The vanity of the king, the brags of the king are all subject to remote past. Nothing around the destroyed statue was there except boundless desert. The shattered pieces are only present and except that everything has turned into debris in the cruel hand of time.  

f) What is your impression of Ozymandias as a king?

Answer-Ozymandias like many other kings is proud, arrogant and stuffed with shallow thinking. He considered himself incomparable in regard to his greatness and achievements. He was a person with condescending attitude who never could realize that everything in the world is subject to decay, decline and destruction with no exception.

g) What message is conveyed through the poem.

Answer-The Might and majesty of a king do not last! Only great art endures for a period of time. The statue symbolizing the glory of pharaoh is crumbling. Now except some fine pieces of work by the sculptor nothing remaining. The bottom line is ‘time plays its final hand on every living and non-living creation and a proud king like Ozymandias is of no exception’.