The Influence on Girl's Body Image in Piercy's Barbie Doll

Piercy’s poem, “Barbie Doll”, bluntly achieves the idea that society pushes girls to look at Barbie for the perfect body image. Barbies are unrealistic dolls with unproportionable body parts, imaging the “idealized” beauty. Girls desire to look like Barbie and will go great lengths to achieve the perfect look. Piercy gets this point across with her free verse poem and metaphors. The girlchild’s life is a metaphor for harm that society does to her with beauty standards and opens the poem by introducing the girlchild exposed to certain gifts and talents.

In the first stanza, the girlchild was born normal then is presented with gifts, “with dolls that pee-pee / and miniature GE stoves and irons / and wee lipsticks the color of cherry candy” (2-4). Each of the gifts she is handed seems to send a message on women’s roles in society. The role of motherhood is being represented through the doll she is receiving (2). Society is teaching the girlchild that being a mother is the gender expectations. Domestic roles are also being taught with the stove and iron implying kitchen work, housework, and what is traditionally expected of women who stay at home (3). Lipsticks implies that makeup is what’s needed to look beautiful and attractive (4). These gifts are teaching the girl how to present herself in a feminine manner. Piercy is criticizing society by showing that despite the other talents the girlchild may have, these gifts are important because it’s what is expected of her when she grows up. There is then a turning point in lines 5-6 where conflict sets for the girl when she begins to be criticized for her appearance. The term “magic of puberty” (5) is ironic because puberty is not a magical time but a nightmare for most girls where they’re most vulnerable and learning the changes of their bodies.

In the second stanza, the opening is a list of the girls’ actual qualities. “She was healthy, tested intelligent, / possessed strong arms and back, / abundant sexual drive and manual dexterity” (7-9), are positive qualities that give the girlchild strength and knowledge. Despite her positive qualities, “she went to and fro apologizing” (10). Society didn’t recognize her good qualities, all they noticed was “a fat nose on thick legs” (11) and her initial reaction is to apologize for not fitting in with the ideal feminine beauty. The idea of apologizing is important because it is an inner conflict within herself, by not feeling pretty enough for society. She feels guilt for something she cannot control.

In the third stanza, she worsens her problem by trying to compensate what she is lacking for society. She alters herself to “play coy” (12) and “come on hearty” (13) to distract society with these behaviors to hide the beauty that she is lacking. She also begins to “exercise, [and] diet” (14) to change to make up what society sees as a physical flaw. With these certain behaviors she believes that by changing, people will then begin to like her because she wasn’t good enough the way she was born. Like all humans, she eventually gets tired and “her good nature wore out / like a fan belt” (15-16). Just like car fan belts, she was stretched to her fullest capacity and was broken. Something broke within her and got tired of trying to live up to the expectations that others wanted her to be and led her to “cut off her nose and legs” (17).

In the final stanza, it reveals the culmination of the girl’s death. As the result of cutting her nose and legs (17) she ends up dead displaying her body “in the casket displayed [in] satin” (19). She has a “turned-up putty nose,” (21) showing the cosmetic changes she did to her body altering to society’s perfect body image and “cosmetics painted on” (20) showing that she has finally achieved the physical perfection she had always desired. She was “dressed in a pink and white nightie” (22) to show her femininity with the feminine colors but also sexualizing her body. This last stanza shows a lot of irony because she finally achieved what she had always wanted but with the expense of her life. At this point she truly starts to looks like a Barbie, tying back in with the title. Society finally acknowledged her beauty when they said “doesn’t she look pretty?” (23) as she laid in her barbie box. Her inner beauty was never truly recognized and was forced to change for society by killing herself to for others to see her beauty. Ultimately, her “happy ending” (25) is not a happy ending.