Jade Flower Palace
Ozymandias
Tu Fu, translated by Kenneth Rexroth
Percy Bysshe Shelley
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The stream swirls. The wind moans in
The pines. Gray rats scurry over
Broken tiles. What prince, long ago,
Built this palace, standing in
Ruins beside the cliffs? There are
Green ghost fires in the black rooms.
The shattered pavements are all
Washed away. Ten thousand organ
Pipes whistle and roar. The storm
Scatters the red autumn leaves.
His dancing girls are yellow dust.
Their painted cheeks have crumbled
Away. His gold chariots
And courtiers are gone. Only
A stone horse is left of his
Glory. I sit on the grass and
Start a poem, but the pathos of
It overcomes me. The future
Slips imperceptibly away.
Who can say what the years will bring?
I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of
stone
Stand in the desert…Near them, on the
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sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose
frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
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read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless
things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart
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that fed;
And of the pedestal these words appear:
‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
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The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
For the whole earth is the tomb of famous men; not only are they commemorated by columns and inscriptions in their own country, but in foreign
lands there dwells also an unwritten memorial of them, graven not on stone but in the hearts of men.
Pericles' Funeral Oration (after 490 BCE)
TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
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1. The Road Not Taken
You must use this other text to support an argument (your thesis) that there is a common theme related
to the human condition that exists in Gilgamesh.
Your essay must include
1. “The Epic of Gilgamesh”
2. Another in-class source—creation myths, art, poetry, or story that we have looked at.
In order to deal with a common theme connected to the human condition, you must write
a thesis arguing that “Gilgamesh” and other works are indicative of a common quality of
humanity. You must incorporate one other in-class text or creation myth.
Even though our essay will be focused by “The Epic of Gilgamesh,” I am asking you to go
further. We have looked at Creation Myths and early art and noticed that at their root, they are
indicative of the human desire to make sense of existence, death; they are attempts to explain and
understand the world, to explore our identity and our need for companionship; they are even attempts
to become immortal through what we create.
Name________________________ Period_____________
Robert Frost (1874–1963). Mountain Interval. 1920.