Art has an immortal tongue; it speaks to and for generations. The handprint paintings of Sulawesi, made about forty thousand years ago, still do not fail to evoke our imaginations about the artist who decided to make his mark as history’s first painter. Art’s immortality is best cherished in poetry because its message is unaffected by the blight of time. Poetry bears the marks of its context i.e. socio-political environment in which it was written. Mark Twain once said, “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” And so one can infer that a poem’s rhyming scheme too bears a message for history.
As a student of both political science and English literature, the study of poetry and politics come hand in hand; therefore, interpreting history involves the collision of the worlds of both poetry and politics. This becomes an exciting study especially in the current world where ideals like peace and harmony become lost causes when faced with scenarios like war, genocide, nuclear threat, climate change, purges, invasions, etc. Amid rising geopolitical tensions, increasing nationalistic fervour and unstable governments, it is with a curious and didactic intent that one ought to hear the message that poetry bears for the ruler and the ruled.
Weighed and found wanting :
“Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
Percy Bysshe Shelley, in his poem “Ozymandias”, plays the role of a Daniel-esque figure when it comes to confronting tyrannical rulers. Still, unlike Daniel, we see Shelley indirectly communicating to a pharaoh through a complex time loop; he addresses the past pharaoh through a recollection of his conversation about a colossal wreck with “ A traveller from an antique land”. Perhaps Shelly did so to show how distant a tyrant becomes in the mind of time and the passing of the ages. Nevertheless, he bears a similar message to that of Daniel: only time weighs the acts of tyrants and finds them wanting.
Shelly reiterates a firsthand account of a colossal wreck, which lies in ruins, had a shattered visage and two vast trunkless legs of stone, along with a saying on the pedestal which glorified the king. Apart from the description Shelly provides, a dual narrative that bears a message for the tyrants of his time and of the future as well. This message is conveyed indirectly by shifting the focus of praise from the statue to its maker such a shift implies that a ruler, despite his power, will eventually become a mortal figment of thought, whose life is communicated only by lifeless remnants. People only recognise the past which has been able to contribute positively to the present, and in the context of the poem, the statue, despite its condition, allows for the praise of the artist who sculpted it rather than the tyrant whom it represents. The poem, in fact, seems to be a rebuttal of the Machiavellian concept of “Ragione di Stato” where tyranny was justified when intended for the preservation of the state. PB Shelley supersedes this claim by concentrating on the power of time, which can make a mockery of the greatest empires and rulers.
The reading on the pedestal serves as a warning for the tyrants of the present :
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Ozymandias’s pedestal warns the rulers who aim for immortality over governance; the mighty are called to look and despair. This would have been true in the past when one looked at King Ozymandias’s power, but this remains true even to this day; the mighty now look in horror at his works, for they are non-existent; the mighty have every cause to despair, for their works would also be swallowed by the vast desert sands and their lives sifted over by time’s ignorant hands.
Ever seeing, but never perceiving :
“And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?”
While P.B. Shelley bears a message for the ruler, William Butler Yeats in his work “The Second Coming” bears an oracle for the ruled. His poem portrays him as a troubled prophet who has a terrible vision for the future of mankind and calls out to his people to act before it is too late. He sees the ruled as responsible for a disillusioned world.
WB Yeats describes a world in crisis; a world of anarchy where chaos and crime reign. He describes seeing a “Blood dimmed tide” and the innocent being drowned in it; he visualises a beast with an unmerciful and pitiless glance, slouching toward Bethlehem to be born. WB Yeats terrifies the reader and raises many questions regarding the reason for the state of his world; he conjures up a Hobbesian state of nature, where the contract between society and sovereign has been breached and therefore has reached a state of chaos and anarchy. But unlike Hobbes, WB Yeats delves into a moral explanation for the state of society.
WB Yeats speaks about two groups of people right in between his description of the present and his vision for the future, in the following lines:
“The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.”
The reason for a world of wickedness and chaos is not the absence of the good; rather, it is their silence. The foil to a democratic society is when the best of its people lack enthusiasm in governance while the worst are filled with passionate intensity for power. It would do the world a great deal of good if the good are zealous and share the zeal of the wicked. WB Yeats strategically places these lines right before he realises a beastly figure rising from the desert sands; this implies that in many cases people are responsible for the rulers they choose. It is when they just become blind witnesses, “Ever seeing and never perceiving”, that corrupt tyrants rise.
Wisdom’s call :
In the midst of all the chaos, the voice of wisdom thunders out
“To you, O people, I call out;
I raise my voice to all mankind.
5 You who are simple, gain prudence;
you who are foolish, set your hearts on it.”
Poetry resonates the call of wisdom, as we see the world around us and realise its patterns; do we heed this call, the call for an informed citizenry, the call for responsible rulers, the call to wake from one’s ideal slumber and grasp the truth about the reality of unchecked power? Have we heard this call?