Editing 1557: Ozymandias

Jump to: navigation, search

Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.

The edit can be undone. Please check the comparison below to verify that this is what you want to do, and then save the changes below to finish undoing the edit.
Latest revision Your text
Line 4: Line 4:
 
| title    = Ozymandias
 
| title    = Ozymandias
 
| image    = ozymandias.png
 
| image    = ozymandias.png
−
| titletext = And on the pedestal these words appear: "And on the pedestal these words appear: "And on the pedestal these words appear: "And...
+
| titletext = And on the pedestal these words appear: "And on the pedestal these words appear: "And on the pedestal these words appear: "And ...
 
}}
 
}}
  
 
==Explanation==
 
==Explanation==
−
[[Ponytail]] is reciting the opening of "{{w|Ozymandias}}" by {{w|Percy Bysshe Shelley}} (see [[#Ozymandias text|text]] below).
+
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page.}}
−
 
+
The title is a reference to a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Both the comic and the poem begin "I met a traveller from an antique land
−
The poem Ozymandias is about the last vestiges of a {{w|Ancient Egypt|once-great civilization}} that has since been lost to history. The poem is based on nested quotations: the poet, speaking to the reader, quotes a "traveler", who ultimately quotes words carved in the pedestal of a crumbling statue. When people recite the poem, they add yet another level of nesting, as the reader is quoting the poet, who's quoting the traveler, who's quoting the pedestal.
+
Who said", but the comic then goes into a recursive loop. The original poem (first published in 1818 and therefore presumably in the public domain) is:<p>
−
 
+
'''Shelley's "Ozymandias'''"<br>
−
When Ponytail recites this poem, rather than reciting it normally, she adds more layers of recursive nesting, suggesting that she heard the story from a traveler, who heard it from another traveler, who heard it from another traveler. It's not clear how many layers of nesting this goes through before the rest of the text is cited (or whether the recursion is infinite).
+
I met a traveller from an antique land<br>
−
 
+
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone<br>
−
The title similarly plays with recursion, quoting a pedestal which quotes a string of other pedestals.
+
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,<br>
−
 
+
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,<br>
−
The quotes are not nested properly, as they never end. So there is only the starting quotation mark (") for each quote. If she ever finishes there would be one closing quotation mark for each quote in the recursion at the end of her sentence. See [[859: (]].
+
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,<br>
−
 
+
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read<br>
−
A similar joke was used in [[785: Open Mic Night]]
+
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,<br>
−
 
+
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:<br>
−
===Ozymandias text===
+
And on the pedestal these words appear:<br>
−
:I met a traveller from an antique land<br />
+
'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:<br>
−
:Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone<br />
+
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'<br>
−
:Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,<br />
+
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay<br>
−
:Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,<br />
+
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare<br>
−
:And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,<br />
+
The lone and level sands stretch far away."<ref name="Shelley1826">Percy Bysshe Shelley, "Ozymandias" in ''[https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=MZY9AAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&authuser=0&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA100 Miscellaneous and Posthumous Poems of Percy Bysshe Shelley]'' (London: W. Benbow, 1826), 100.</ref>
−
:Tell that its sculptor well those passions read<br />
 
−
:Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,<br />
 
−
:The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:<br />
 
−
:And on the pedestal these words appear:<br />
 
−
:'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:<br />
 
−
:Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'<br />
 
−
:Nothing beside remains. Round the decay<br />
 
−
:Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare<br />
 
−
:The lone and level sands stretch far away."<ref name="Shelley1826">Percy Bysshe Shelley, "Ozymandias" in ''[https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=MZY9AAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&authuser=0&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA100 Miscellaneous and Posthumous Poems of Percy Bysshe Shelley]'' (London: W. Benbow, 1826), 100.</ref><br />
 
−
<references/>
 
  
 
==Transcript==
 
==Transcript==
−
:[Ponytail, with her arms stretched out, is addressing Cueball.]
+
:Ponytail (to Cueball): I met a traveler from an antique land who said: "I met a traveler from an antique land, who said "I met a traveler from an antique land, who said "I met ...
−
:Ponytail:
 
−
:I met a traveler from an antique land
 
−
:who said: "I met a traveler from an an-
 
−
:tique land, who said "I met a traveler from
 
−
:an antique land, who said "I met...
 
  
 
{{comic discussion}}
 
{{comic discussion}}
−
[[Category:Recursion]]
 
−
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
 
−
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
 

Please note that all contributions to explain xkcd may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here.
You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see explain xkcd:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission!

To protect the wiki against automated edit spam, we kindly ask you to solve the following CAPTCHA:

Cancel | Editing help (opens in new window)

Templates used on this page:

Retrieved from "https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1557:_Ozymandias"