It can be compared to the poem "my last duchess" by Robert Browning
In both Ozymandias and My Last Duchess, the legacy of the subject is told through the voice of another person. The poems are similar in their use of layers of narration.
The story of Ozymandias is delivered in two voices rather than one. "I met a wanderer from an antique nation, Who stated..." Shelley begins. The poet's subject is diminished and m0cked by the use of two voices, as his story is reduced to a passing folk-tale.
The reader even wonders if the land existed at all when it is referred to as a "antique land." This is paradoxical, because it contradicts the power he supposedly possessed in a previous life - "Look on my handiwork, ye Mighty, and desp4ir!"
The poem My Last Duchess is distinct in its use of the dramatic monologue - the Dµke of Ferrara - but similar in that the Duchess lacks the agency to speak for herself. My Last Duchess is similar in that the Duchess lacks the ability to speak for herself. This is due to the fact that the story is untrustworthy, as we learn that the Dµke was plagued by jealousy during their relationship.
This is most evident in the lines "she liked whate'er / She looked on, and her looks went everywhere"; the repetition of the word "looks" indicates the Dµke's suspicious nature, implying that a simple look was a sign of the Duchess' infidelity.
In conclusion we can say that these two poems are similar because-
Both subjects are inanimate objects- a statue of the King in Ozymandias and a painting of the Duchess in My Last Duchess.The King and Du ke make a point of speaking about themselves in a self-centered manner throughout both poems.Both poems were critical of and m0cked power, sending the message that no matter how tyrannical or important your current position is, it is only temporary.Both poems depict male characters with high status, power, and tyr4nny. The themes of control and power are present in both Ozymandias and My Last Duchess, and they are both employed negatively.The rulers both eventually lose their power; the poems demonstrate the irony of how self-absorbed and confident these people were about their power, yet they are now nothing more than an old folktale of the past.
Some of their differences:
One lost power as a result of d3ath(murd3r), while the other gradually lost power over time.They have artwork of themselves in one of the poems, and artwork of others in the other.They have different rhyming schemesThey are different types of poems My last duchess is a dramatic monologue, whereas Ozymandias is a sonnetThe subjects in the poems have power, but the source is different. Ozymandias refers to a king, whereas my last duchess refers to a dµke.
