Page 40 - Point 5 Literature Program Option 1 Teachers Guide (2) (1)

Working Through the Unit

Pre-Reading Activity
ozymandias is the Greek name of the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses ii, Ramses the Great, Pharaoh
th
of the 19 dynasty of ancient Egypt. He ruled Egypt for 67 years and built many cities, as well as
monuments in his own honor. Ramses proudly called himself King of Kings. Ramses is thought to
have been pharaoh at the time of the Exodus.
Answer
1. User Maat Re

Basic Understanding
This section offers a Key Vocabulary list, followed by Vocabulary Practice. Questions test the
students’ comprehension of the language of the poem.

Key Vocabulary
students may refer to the Key Vocabulary list when they do the Vocabulary Practice exercise.

Vocabulary Practice
Answers
1. wrinkled 2. shattered 3. a frown 4. remains 5. boundless

Questions
The questions in this section verify the students’ understanding of the poem.
Answers might include:
1. The traveler had been to Egypt. (an antique land)
2. The traveler came across the ruins of a statue. Only two legs on an inscribed pedestal and a fallen head remained.
(Two vast and trunkless legs of stone … a shattered visage lies … on the pedestal these words …)
3. The face shows an arrogant, mocking, superior frown. (… whose frown … wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command …)
4. The sculptor was very good at seeing and understanding facial expressions and sculpting them. (… its sculptor well
those passions read …)
5. There was an inscription on the pedestal. (My name is Ozymandias…)
6. a. Ozymandias
b. He is speaking to all other kings of the present and the future.
c. It means that he thinks he is much greater than all of them and they have no hope of ever being as great as he is.

7. There is nothing but the sands of the desert around the ruined statue.

Analysis and Interpretation
Questions 1 and 2 require students to use the thinking skill of Identifying parts and whole. a sonnet
is an excellent target for this skill because it has a natural physical division into octave and sestet.
The skill is then taught inductively, after students have answered the questions.

Answers might include:
1. a. The poem is a sonnet and has two parts.
b. The parts are an octave (first eight lines) and a sestet (last six lines).
2. a. In the octave a traveler reports finding a large, ruined statue in Egypt.
b. In the sestet the statue is identified by the inscribed pedestal as Ozymandias or Ramses II, one of the greatest
pharaohs of Egypt, builder of many cities and monuments and in his own opinion, the King of Kings.

40 ozymandias