The introduction of The Rape of the Lock identifies the poem as a heroi-comical poem- i.e. mock heroic. This style of poem is a type of satire; and in this case, Pope satirises the beau-monde of eighteenth century England

first hints at: ‘the am’rous causes’ Pope describes ar enot comparable to the grand love of Greek hereos, but rather represent a more trivialized version of the same emotion. In lines one and two, Pope suggests that society is taking a fairly trivial incident too seriously, displaying an exaggerated sense of their own importance. The ‘contests’ Pope alludes to prove to be ‘mighty’ only in an ironic sense. They are card-games and frilvous tussles as opppsed to the great battles of epic tradition. Unlike the Helen of Troy, ‘the face that launched a thousand ships’, Belinda prompts foppish nonsense. With Belinda’s dream, Pope exposes the ‘machinery’ of the poem- the supernatural powers the influence the action from behind the scenes. The sprites who watch over Belinda mimic the Greek and Roman Gods of tradition who although at times can be benevolent and malicous, they are always ivolved in earthly events. Belinda is belittles early on in the  poem as Ariel explains that women’s spirits when they diet will return to ‘their first elements, their souls retire’ and thesnomes, sylphs, salamanders and nymphs in turn are associated with the four elements. However Pope makes a point of displaying Belinda’s frilvous nature by referring to her sylph as a ‘light coquette’ which reflects her soul-  full of ‘vanities’ and selfish pleasure. Pope begins to sketch this idea of ‘coquette’ in this initial canto- a theme which will continue into the rest of the poem, with the sylphs becoming an allegory for the mannered conventions that govern female behaviour. Pope continues to make it clear that these women are not conducting themselves on the basis of moral principle, but rather are governed by an elaborate social mechanism- of which the Sylphs are fitting caricatures. This enables Pope to critique the situation whilst exposing the sattire and to exonerate individual women from too severe judgment. If Belinda has all the typical female fobiles, Pope encourages us to recognize this is partly due to the education and training recieved as society is as much to blame as she is. Pope’s portryal of Belinda at her dressing table introduces new mock-heroic motifs. The scene of her toilette is rendered first as a a religous sacrament, in which Belinda herself is thr priestess and her image in the looking glass is the Goddess she serves. This parody of the religous rites before a battle gives way, then, to another kind of mock- epic scene, that of the ritualized arming of the hero. Combs, pins, and cosmetics take the place of weapons as ‘awfuly Beauty puts on all it’s arms’