Commentary on the poem Barbie Doll by Marge Piercy

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Commentary on the poem „Barbie Doll“ by Marge Piercy

The poem „Barbie Doll“ deals with the life of a girl who had a plastic surgery. It is divided in four paragraphs which describe the life of the girl chronological.

Describing the childhood of the girl the first chapter of the poem wants to emphasize how early girls are pushed into the role of motherhood and femininity. The girl's first presents are dolls which are able to urinate („...and presented dolls that did pee-pee“). Those dolls are the first confrontation with her later task of being a mother. Furthermore she gets a miniature oven which is connected to her later task of working in the kitchen („...and miniature GE stoves and irons“). I addition to that she gets her first beauty products. („... and wee lipsticks the color of cherry candy“) This is her first confrontation with beauty and sexuality. Those presents push the girl into a role which connects femininity with motherhood, domesticity and beauty.

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The peot starts giving reason for her plastic surgery already in the first paragraph. After adopting this role the girls is very offended when a classmate called her ugly („...You have a great big nose and fat legs.“)This is a very important sentence of the poem because this is the main reason for her plastic surgery.

The second paragraph shows that the society pushed her succseful into the role of a stereotype woman. Therefore she has a quite low self-estimate because she does not fit this steriotype. She is a healthy intelligent girl but she keeps on apologizing for ...

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