The world is full of outstanding and magnificent things, but due to the effects of human nature and the constant change ones’ world goes through the once magnificent objects lay waste in forgotten fields and valleys. In “Ozymandias” by Percy Bysshe Shelley and “By the Water of Babylon” by Stephen Vincent Benet, the idea of our ever-changing world is presented to us in two different ways. Throughout each literary work the authors use connotation, symbols, and metaphors to present the readers with two themes that greatly coincide with one another.
First and foremost, “The Waters of Babylon” by Stephen Vincent Benet is set in a futuristic time period. In the story we are presented with a young man, named John, who is initiated
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On his journey, John has to pass over a body of water, which is called Ou-dis-sun, this is used to symbolize the Hudson river which surrounds New York City. Upon …show more content…
Two vast legs of stone stand without a body, and near them a massive, crumbling stone head lies “half sunk” in the sand. The traveler told the speaker that the frown and “sneer of cold command” on the statue’s face indicate that the sculptor understood well the emotions (or "passions") of the statue’s subject. The memory of those emotions survives "stamped" on the lifeless statue, even though both the sculptor and his subject are both now dead. On the pedestal of the statue appear the words, “My name is Ozymandias, king of kings, Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!” But around the decaying ruin of the statue, nothing remains, only the “lone and level sands,” which stretch out around it. With the use of connotation, the theme is presented clearly to be that nothing has to last