Identity
Ozymandias
The aim of the statue was to immortalise the identity of Ozymandias:
- ‘Half sunk, a shattered visage lies’
- ‘wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command’
- ‘survive, stamped on these lifeless things
- _‘words appear: ‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’ ’ _
London
The citizens of London are distressed by their situation:
- Mark in every face I meet Marks of weakness, marks of woe.’
- ‘every cry of every Man’
- ‘infants cry of fear;
- ‘mind-forged manacles’
- ‘hapless soldiers sigh’
- ‘youthful Harlots’
My Last Duchess
The Duchess is only known through the perspective of the Duke. He reveals a lot about his own character too:
- ‘That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall’
- ‘Fra Pandolf’s hands Worked busily a day’
- ‘The curtain I have drawn for you’
- ‘A heart- how shall I say?- too soon made glad, too easily impressed’
- She thanked me- good!
- ‘My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name’
- ‘I choose Never to stoop’
- ‘I gave commands; Then all smiles stopped together’
The Charge of the Light Brigade
The individual names of the soldiers who were fought as part of the Light Brigade, are not know. They are always referred to as a collective group:
- ‘Half a league, half a league’
- ‘Rode the six hundred.’
- ‘ “Forward, the Light Brigade! Charge for the guns!” he said.’
- ‘Then they rode back, but not Not the six hundred.’
- ‘horse and hero fell’
- ‘They fought so well’
Tissue
A person’s identity is shaped by their experiences and history:
- ‘the Koran’
- ‘names and histories’
- ‘who was born to whom, the height and weight, who died where and how’
- ‘The sun shines through their borderlines’
- ‘with living tissue, raise a structure never meant to last’
- ‘turned into your skin’
The Emigree
The speaker’s confusion arises as her childhood memories are in conflict with her adult understanding:
- ‘There once was a country… I left it as a child’
- ‘I am branded by an impression of sunlight’
- ‘child’s vocabulary I carried here like a hollow doll’
- ‘I have no passport, there’s no way back at all’
- They accuse me of absence… being dark in their free city.’
Kamikaze
The identity of the pilot changes according to his circumstances:
- ‘a samurai sword… a shaven head full of powerful incantations
- _ ‘father’s boat safe’_
- ‘they treated him as though he no longer existed’
- ‘this was no longer the father we loved’
Checking Out Me History
The student is frustrated with the education that he is receiving; he wants to know about his own heritage and history.
- ‘Dem tell me Wha dem want to tell me’
- ‘dem never tell me bout…’
- ‘now I checking out me own history’
- ‘I carving out me identity’