Compare how poets present ideas about power in ‘Ozymandias’ and in ONE other

poem from Power and Conflict. [30 marks] My Last Duchess

Ozymandias
Nature – Humans think they dominate with
power – “king of kings” yet nature
overpowers shown by the destruction of the
statue – “colossal wreck”
Power runs out over time whereas natures
power is always there.
Other Poem of your Choice
Men want power and when they don’t have
it, they feel powerless
Men who have a high social status think
they have more power yet it doesn’t always
go their way. Control women - objectify

People want to show their power but this

damages their dominance

Both poems explore the idea of power and how humans assume they have control but
actually their self-imposed dominance can easily be undermined.

How is man’s relationship to nature presented in Blake’s poem ‘London?’

Compare it with one other poem of your choice.
London
• Detrimental impact of living in an
industrialised city. The city seems to
negatively imprint itself upon the
city-bound dwellers.
“marks of weakness, marks of woe”
• Man trying to control the natural
world
“chartered Thames”
• People governed by economic
considerations
“chimney-sweeper’s cry”
“youthful harlot’s curse”
• The poem contains a prevailing
sense of death and decay
“the marriage hearse”
The Prelude
• Wordsworth receives powerful
sensations from exposure to nature.
“troubled pleasure”
“upreared its head”
• His child’s mind is shaped by the
raw strength of the sublime
characteristics of natural
phenomenon.
“were a trouble to my dreams”
• Nature seems alive
“like a living thing / Strode after
me.”
• Nature possessed of an underlying
power. Anyone who comes into
direct contact with it, will have the
experience imprinted upon their very
being.
“over my thoughts / There hung a
darkness”