Kevin Paredes

One piece that resonated with me was the irony of the Temple of Dendur. Technically, the temple itself is not a traditional piece, rather, it was constructed by the Romans. It stands strong and is very stable in nature, which is amazing for a structure over 2000 years old, but what made me most interested about it was the comparison between the structure itself and Percy Bysshe Shelley’s poem Ozymandias. Based on the poem, Ozymandias is supposed to be an important king and prominent figure, but the way in which his structure was preserved does not indicate that anyone cared about the statue. The poem itself is a claim of importance, but the statue is in a “colossal wreck.” Conversely, the Temple of Dendur is a structure that represents nothing except for being a gift to other prominent figures in Egypt. It was in good condition when it was found, and its figure  and structure was properly preserved. 

Ode to the West Wind

by Percy Shelley

(Stanza 2; lines 15 – 20)

“Thou on whose stream, mid the steep sky’s commotion,
Loose clouds like earth’s decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,

Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread
On the blue surface of thine a{:e}ry surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head”

According to Edmund Burke, sublime images conjure up a myriad of emotions ranging from fear, joy, surprise, horror, pain and excitement all in one sensational moment in our experiences.  In the sublime there is an element of drama and spontaneity that captures the audience’ undivided attention.  In the above extract from Ode to the West Wind, the reader is transported into a scene where the winds are raging and the vision of the skies depicting imminent gloom.  From the lines “shook from tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean” we are almost awestruck with wonderment and fright at the vision of forces of both Heaven and Ocean coming together at the same time.  This image evokes a sense of fear of a detriment that is about to be unleashed with the strength of the howling winds upon anyone who is caught in the midst.

While the reader prepares for the worst referenced by the “commotion in the sky”, the “angels of rain and lightning … like bright hair uplifted from the head”  tends to soften the blow.  The symbolism of bright haired angels, evokes a sense of calm and protection that one would not usually associate with tumultuous rain and lightning.

Shelley’s description of the West Wind becoming riled and unraveled, and how the rest of nature and by extension civilization around it reacts to its passing brings the sublime into perspective with a less attractive view of wind.  The wind is not described as being calm or massaging but to the contrary a shadow of gloom is painted and a sense of imminent destruction is contemplated.

Percy Shelley “Mutability”

“We are as clouds that veil the midnight moon;

How restlessly they speed, and gleam, and quiver,

Streaking the darkness radiantly! Yet soon

Night closes round, and they are lost for ever…” (1-4)

As Burke detailed the Sublime, he explained that the passions stirred by it are related to Astonishment. This struck me as particularly relatable to Percy Shelley’s “Mutability”. Shelley details the ways in which mankind is affected by the natural forces of life, those of which are outside of our control. This in itself is frightening to us, to consider the fact that, as beings, we are truly not as powerful as we would like to consider ourselves to be. Yet, in this fear, there is also a great level of astonishment when you consider how vast and complicated this universe truly is – and how small we are in comparison. There is great beauty in that fact.

This is also very closely related to what was stated in the video, that the Sublime is/will “overwhelm us, and is terrifying…paradoxically, they still delight us. We peer over the edge of a precipice, are frightened, but manage to feel a kind of delight in our experience despite the danger…the sheer power is exhilarating”. To read “Mutability”, especially the first stanza, puts in perspective the struggle between nature and mankind, and how both are united. Such a vast concept is absolutely Sublime, as we consider ourselves a part of nature, but when “Night closes round”, we are “lost for ever” (4). We can begin to acknowledge that in relation to nature, we are truly powerless to its vastness. This is Sublime in that it is terrifying, yet at the same time, it is beautiful and almost comforting to know that there is something bigger than ourselves – and that it will continue to function and exist despite how we feel about it.

Click through for Kinney’s essay. This image, which she uses to illustrate the essay, is drawn from the manuscripts housed on the shelleygodwinarchive.org site.

Writer Alison Kinney, in her essay “A FILTHY PROCESS IN WHICH I WAS ENGAGED”: REVISING FRANKENSTEIN“A FILTHY PROCESS IN WHICH I WAS ENGAGED”: REVISING FRANKENSTEIN, considers both the changes Mary Shelley made in revising her novel and the reasons she may have downplayed the those revisions. Not only does the essay offer insights into the context in which Shelley wrote, it’s also, I think, inspiring to anyone who’s ever struggled through the writing process.

If you’re interested in reading more about the changes Mary Shelley made from the 1811 to the 1831 edition of the novel, see this excerpt from Anne Mellor’s book, Mary Shelley: Her Life, Her Fiction, Her Monsters.

“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert…Near them, on the sand”

…..

“Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

The sublime is described by Burke in terms of vastness, terror, and beauty. He defines it as something that evokes emotions and passion, the greatest being astonishment. He is careful to makes a distinction between beauty and the sublime. In Burke’s writings he makes it clear that terror and vastness are the primary qualities of the sublime and that beauty is different. In making the comparison between the sublime and beauty he notes that the sublime is something great, powerful, or vast. On the other hand, Burke sees beauty as something denoted by things that are comparatively smaller.

Shelley’s Ozymandias contains the notion of the sublime which is depicted through a strong use of imagery and a careful choice of words. Upon reading the first two lines, I immediately picture an endless desert occupied solely by an immense, broken statue. While initially it may appear to be a simple scene, these lines evoke a sense of awe. If you think about it, how would you respond if you were in an empty desert, surrounded by nothing but sand, sky, and an enormous statue that is broken from the legs up? This poem particularly stood out to me after reading Burke’s ideas regarding the sublime because of his comparison between length, height, and depth. Shelley chose to present two things together: the desert and a huge statue. The desert would correspond to Burke’s mention of length, whereas the statue would represent height. Burke explains that even ground (like the desert: “lone and level sands stretch far away”) is not strong enough alone to evoke a strong sense of the sublime. He supports this notion by explaining that height is much more successful in the depiction of the sublime. Shelley combines both length and height and successfully fulfills Burke’s idea of a perpendicular. In the case of this poem, the perpendicular is between the flat desert and the legs of the statue. Additionally, the broken façade of the statue is, by Burke’s standards, a much more powerful image than presenting something that is intact. The words “colossal wreck” add even more to the poem. When one thinks about a wreck or mess of some kind, it makes sense to assume its not pleasant; however, it can be much more powerful than something that IS pleasant. Being given a sense of fear, anxiety, or astonishment is exactly what Burke mentions is necessary when finding the sublime in literature. While Burke’s standards of the sublime may differ slightly from that of other writers, I have to say I am in agreement with his statements. If the poem had instead described a massive statue that was perfectly polished without any type of flaw, I know I wouldn’t be satisfied; it would feel like something was missing. Shelley’s combination of a perpendicular image, the broken façade, and her strong use of words work together to form a poem that I feel evokes the real meaning of the sublime.

“They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose,

Nor spake, nor moved their eyes;

It had been strange, even in a dream,

To have seen those dead men rise.”

Lines 331-334 from Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Burke defines vastness in terms of dimension. The ocean, for instance, might be considered sublime in that it is unfathomably vast in dimension. The inability to wrap one’s mind around it’s largess results, for some, in “no small terror”, which Burke would say only serves to enhance it’s essence of the sublime. If Burke feels that terror is a ruling principle of the sublime, then Coleridge has mastered it. There is picturesque horror presented throughout the entirety of ,The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, in images of evil spirits, corpses coming to life, ghost ships moved not by wind in their sails but by some external power, and even in the Mariner himself. Even so, I would argue that the true sublime power of this poem is not in the poem itself but in the ability of the human mind to envision it all. I have never seen a corpse come to life and yet I had no trouble envisioning a ship deck full of cold, dead-eyed corpses suddenly rising and once again manning the ship. I have never seen a soul depart from a body and “dart to the Sun” (line 355), and yet, here I sit with an image of it happening, clear as day.

“Habituated to the Vast”, were the words Coleridge once used to describe his own mind. After reading The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, one can safely assume that the success of this poem relies heavily on the ability of the readers to send their own minds into “the Vast”. Coleridge is painting pictures of objects and events that are not actually ever present in reality. Without the ability to suspend one’s disbelief and fully submerge one’s mind into this imagined reality, the magic of the poem would be lost. The ocean may be unfathomably vast in dimension but the human mind is unfathomably vast in that it has no dimension. The knowledge that there is no true limit to what one’s mind can see or create is equally thrilling and terrifying. Is it not this juxtaposition that Burke says rules the sublime? Coleridge may summon the sublime through both terror and astonishment with his words, but it is the minds ability to realize this terror and astonishment that is truly sublime.

“The everlasting universe of things

Flows through the mind, and rolls its rapid waves,

….”

This opening lyric from Percy Shelleys Mont Blanc expresses passion for the vastness of both nature and the human mind. “Everlasting,” as an adjective is redundant when describing the known universe, however its definition as a noun gives it an omnipotent conjunction.  There are other aspects in this poem that reference an omnipotence, Line 54 questions the presence of God in dreams, line 60 places nature above God and the fifth stanza suggests a inhabiting God.  But the early lines above, “The everlasting universe of things,” is Shelleys sublime measurement that describes the vastness of the mind of men. As per Burkes, A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful (1757) the sublime is easily identified by the “greatness of dimension.”

This vastness of mens mind is further identified as the poems passion; the thoughts flow allegorically through in this natural setting. Astonishing are the rivers, fields, ravines and paths here and this further supports Burkes definition of the sublime. Burke adds that perspective from high above, one that looks down on the subject can support grand scale, “…we are more struck at looking down from a precipice, than looking up at an object of equal height.” Starting the poem above the picturesque mountain establishes Mont Blanc as having enormous capacity.

This sublime description of the mind of men can be astounding as the poem establishes a vast mental measurement where the reader associates the subject with himself. This is an additional feature in Burkes understanding of the sublime.

-Chris Hennessy

” Oh! Lift me as a wave, a leaf a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed
One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.”
From Ode to the West Wind by Percy Shelley

Burke makes a very clear distinction between what he defines as beautiful, and what he defines as sublime. From my understanding the distinction is made in the fact that something that is sublime has a dark side to it, it creates a sense of fear, but at the same time brings about something tempting and intriguing. As if he is saying that something that is scary can not necessarily be marked as beautiful, rather sublime. Like being caught in a thunderstorm. I think that this excerpt from Percy Shelley’s poem Ode to the West Wind is a good example of the idea that something that one may see as scary is in fact beautiful,rather than sublime. In his poem, Shelley lists his ambitions, and he comes to a realization that there are many things that he is unable to do. He addresses the wind, and tells it that he would like even a fraction of the freedom that it has. He sees time as a burden, which we see in the line “a heavy weight of hours…”, and this idea of being free like the wind is something that is very appealing to him. The wind has the ability to move, to be free, to not be bound by time, to have peace, and Shelley wants that. The idea of living free, not bound to anything, to move through the air like a leaf, bleeding from falling onto the thorns of life are all very scary images, but they motivate Shelley. I don’t necessarily know if these would be classified as part of the sublime, I think that they are actually more along the lines of being called beautiful, because to Shelley he wants to be untamed like the wind, and free at heart.