digital-arts
Original: digital-arts on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1:
Woman with dark hair: You know the poem Ozymandias, by Shelley?
Pale blonde person: Yeah, it describes a fallen statue of a once-powerful king.
Panel 2:
Woman with dark hair: It's a meditation on the smallness of human life before boundless time and change.
Pale blonde person: Nah.
Panel 3:
Pale blonde person: Art has to be reevaluated in light of circumstance. Let's be real - that poem is now digitized countless copies have been made, readings of it have been transmitted into space. Those words will persist long after the sun engulfs the earth and the solar system goes dark.
Panel 4:
Pale blonde person: Building a giant statue got Ozymandias into a poem which will in fact outlast "the lone and level sands" that "stretch far away."
Panel 5:
Woman with dark hair: What an uplifting poem.
Pale blonde person: Immortality is basically free now, except that you still die.
Votey:
Caption: This butt drawing will one day be viewed on Mars.
(An arrow points up toward two arched lines drawn above the text.)
Woman with dark hair: You know the poem Ozymandias, by Shelley?
Pale blonde person: Yeah, it describes a fallen statue of a once-powerful king.
Panel 2:
Woman with dark hair: It's a meditation on the smallness of human life before boundless time and change.
Pale blonde person: Nah.
Panel 3:
Pale blonde person: Art has to be reevaluated in light of circumstance. Let's be real - that poem is now digitized countless copies have been made, readings of it have been transmitted into space. Those words will persist long after the sun engulfs the earth and the solar system goes dark.
Panel 4:
Pale blonde person: Building a giant statue got Ozymandias into a poem which will in fact outlast "the lone and level sands" that "stretch far away."
Panel 5:
Woman with dark hair: What an uplifting poem.
Pale blonde person: Immortality is basically free now, except that you still die.
Votey:
Caption: This butt drawing will one day be viewed on Mars.
(An arrow points up toward two arched lines drawn above the text.)
Alt text
A five-panel SMBC comic. A dark-haired woman and a pale blonde person discuss Shelley's poem "Ozymandias." The woman asks if the blonde knows the poem; the blonde says yes, it describes a fallen statue of a once-powerful king. The woman calls it a meditation on the smallness of human life before boundless time and change. The blonde says "Nah" and argues that art must be reevaluated in light of circumstance: the poem is now digitized in countless copies and readings of it have been transmitted into space, so the words will persist long after the sun engulfs the earth and the solar system goes dark. The blonde concludes that building a giant statue got Ozymandias into a poem that will in fact outlast "the lone and level sands" the poem describes. The woman dryly says "What an uplifting poem," and the blonde adds, "Immortality is basically free now, except that you still die." Votey (aftercomic): two crude arched lines suggesting a pair of buttocks, with an arrow pointing up at them and the caption "This butt drawing will one day be viewed on Mars."
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.