The surprising thing about the line from Shelley's sonnet quoted on tonight's episode ("Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!") is not that Mr. Ginsberg knows the poem but that art director Stan, the unremitting philistine, should also know it -- and know it well enough to point out, to Ginsberg and bystander Peggy, that the "rest of the poem" rebukes that hubristic utterance. The line joyously mouthed by the young copy-writer is from the monument Ozymandias, "king of kings," built to his vanity. But the great Oz was not an ominipotent ruler for long. Time has ravaged the statue: "Round the decay, / Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, / The lone and level sands stretch far away." -- DL
Lots of poetry references on MAD MEN, from O'Hara's "Meditations in an Emergency" in Season 2 to last week's episode entitled "Lady Lazarus." (And wasn't Pete reading THE CRYING OF LOT 49 on the train last week as well? Not "poetry" but certainly poetic.) Perhaps a Matthew Weiner interview with Best AmPo?
Posted by: Michael Schiavo | May 14, 2012 at 03:08 AM
It's not surprising that Stan Rizzo knew Ozymandias. It was an unremitting part of the public grammar school curriculum in NYC the 1960s. Every school boy or girl knew it.
Don't forget too the entire population was ions more literate.
Posted by: Maryann | May 14, 2012 at 05:28 PM
Maryann:
Yes, they were more literate but I'm certain that their literacy couldn't be measured in ions.
Daniel
Posted by: Daniel | May 15, 2012 at 02:56 PM