Thoughts on "Barbie Doll" by Marge Piercy

My name is Sydney, and this is my blog Universydney. My blog is my way expressing my thoughts and opinions through writing.

My favorite text from this summer is “Barbie Doll” by Piercy. Even though this story has a tragic ending, I enjoyed the irony throughout the poem. I think that Piercy does an excellent job using irony to twist our expectations and change the ending of the poem to something that we would never expect. I liked this poem because it was unpredictable, and I did not know what was going to happen.

            She spends so much time and effort trying to be accepted and considered beautiful, and while I was reading the story, I kept asking myself and wondering how far and to what length is she willing to go to in order to be accepted and recognized by other people. The irony in the story is that she tries so hard her entire life to be perfect and beautiful while she is alive, and it takes the cost of her living for people to finally accept her and recognize her beauty. My question about how far she is willing to go in order to be accepted was answered. She was willing to sacrifice her life, so people finally acknowledge her and her beauty. My favorite part of the poem is the ending, “Consummation at last, to every woman a happy ending.” In the end, she gets the ending that she wants, and they finally call her beautiful, but at that point, it is too late because she has already sacrificed her life. She was ugly in life and somehow beautiful in death.