A Work Of Artifice

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1970

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Download PDF

Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Related Poems

“Barbie Doll” by Marge Piercy (1971)

In this poem, written around the same time as “A Work of Artifice,” Piercy directly tackles the theme of beauty standards. Bleaker in outlook than “A Work of Artifice” and with a tragic denouement, "Barbie Doll" shows how the expectation to be delicate and feminine from an early age can literally break a woman. Though “Barbie Doll” and “A Work of Artifice” have similar themes, they differ in treatment. With its internal and half rhymes and regular stanzaic structure, “Barbie Doll” has the cadence of a lullaby. It deliberately uses childish words such as “pee pee” and “nightie” to show the infantilization of women. The poem is an example of the way Piercy deploys bleak humor and irony when discussing the dark underbelly of social practices.

“Woman Work” by Maya Angelou (1978)

This moving poem by popular feminist poet Angelou (1951-2014) can be interpreted as describing the actual experience of the confined bonsai tree or the domesticated woman. The woman may be safe indoors, but is caught in a relentless cycle of household labor. She poignantly dreams to be caught up in the wild elements so she is freed from the punishing rigor of domesticity. Her desire to be covered by snowflakes and blown away by a storm echo the tree’s fate on a mountainside in “A Work of Artifice.” In both poems, a life in the wild is preferable to predictability and confinement. Nature is not associated with danger but with liberation.

“Poet as Housewife” by Elisabeth Eybers (1990)

South African poet Eybers (1915-2007) was the first woman to publish a poetry collection in Afrikaans. This striking poem has been translated from Afrikaans by Jacquelyn Pope. It explores the difficulty of balancing domestic and creative duties, demolishing the notion that women must expertly perform both roles. The poet of Eybers's poem is an indifferent housewife, with only one request to her male partner: that she be left alone to read. Like “A Work of Artifice,” Eybers’s poem shows that the concept of domesticity as natural to women is false.

Further Literary Resources

"Life of Prose and Poetry — An Inspiring Combination" by Marge Piercy (1999)

In this essay for The New York Times, Piercy provides valuable insights into her creative process. She explains why she needs to write both poetry and fiction, highlighting the differing impulses that drive her to each form. The sections on why she writes poetry are especially relevant to understanding “A Work of Artifice.” Of her poetry process, Piercy says:

There is something so personal and so impersonal at once in the activity that it is addictive. I may be dealing with my own anger, my humiliation, my passion, my pleasure; but once I am working with it in a poem, it becomes molten ore. It becomes "not me."

"The Rumpus Interview with Marge Piercy" by Dara Barnat (2015)

Fellow poet Dara Barnat interviews Piercy for The Rumpus. In the interview, Piercy discusses her childhood in racially divided Detroit and the politics that inform her poetry.

"At Home with Marge Piercy" by Amy E. Schwartz (2019)

Interviewing Piercy for Moment Magazine, writer Amy E. Schwartz discusses the poet’s Jewish heritage, her environmental activism, and her idea of domesticity. The interview, conducted at Piercy’s Cape Cod home, has Piercy providing an overview of her prolific writing career and evolving activism.