Who Is Ozymandias?

An intelligent yet playful look at some of the most teasing and mystifying puzzles at the heart of our greatest poems

Part of the pleasure of poetry is unraveling the mysteries and difficulties it contains and solving the puzzles that lie within. Who, for instance, is Shelley's Ozymandias? What is the Lewis Carroll's Snark? Who is Wallace Stevens's Emperor of Ice-Cream? Or indeed, who is "you" in a poem? In this perceptive and playful new book, an acclaimed poet looks at some of the greatest poems and considers the number of individual puzzles at their heart, casting light on how we should approach these conundrums as readers. From riddling to double entendres, mysterious titles to red herrings, Fuller unpicks the puzzles in works that range from Browning to Bishop, Empson to Eliot, Shelley to Stevens, to help the reader reach the rewards and revelations that lie at the center of some best-loved poems.