Shelley and his friend (a fellow poet), Horace Smith, competed against each other to compose poems on the same subject. (This article suggests that the competition took place in under 15 minutes, which I had not previously learned.) In this case, the subject was a great found statue in Egypt (which I like to picture as the statue from LOST, below). To both poets, descriptions they'd read of the statue invoked themes of decay, the inexorable march of time, and waning power in their poems.
For comparison, Horace Smith's "On a Stupendous Leg of Granite, Discovered Standing by Itself in the Deserts of Egypt, with the Inscription Inserted Below.":
In Egypt's sandy silence, all alone,
Stands a gigantic Leg, which far off throws
The only shadow that the Desart knows:—
"I am great OZYMANDIAS," saith the stone,
"The King of Kings; this mighty City shows
"The wonders of my hand."— The City's gone,—
Nought but the Leg remaining to disclose
The site of this forgotten Babylon.
We wonder,—and some Hunter may express
Wonder like ours, when thro' the wilderness
Where London stood, holding the Wolf in chace,
He meets some fragment huge, and stops to guess
What powerful but unrecorded race
Once dwelt in that annihilated place.
I had heard before that "Ozymandias" was written as a competition, but wasn't aware the it was in 15 minutes. I do wonder how accurate that is though. I don't doubt Shelly's ability as a poet, but I do doubt his ability to compose such a great poem in less than 15 minutes. To think that such an intricate poem was compose off the cuff my reaction is to think that either the time frame is inaccurate or we, as scholars, are delving too deep into the explication. I'm guessing the former is the case. That aside, I really appreciate the LOST reference. When I read this poem that's always my mental image.
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