A WORK OF ARTIFICE- MARGE PIERCY

Summary of A Work of Artifice

“A Work of Artifice” by Marge Piercy uses the image of a bonsai tree to critique societal
pressures that restrict and control individuals, particularly women.
The poem opens with a striking contrast: a bonsai whose growth is restricted to a beautiful
pot, versus its natural potential to reach a great height. This immediately sets the stage for
the poem’s central theme – the limitations placed on individuals by societal expectations.
The gardener’s careful pruning symbolizes the controlling forces that shape people’s lives.
The gardener tells the tree that its “nature” is to be “small and cozy.” This manipulation
reflects how societal expectations can distort our perception of ourselves and our potential.
The poem further criticizes these limitations through references to societal practices that
restrict women, like “bound feet” and “crippled brain.” The pressure placed on women to
conform to a certain standard of beauty is also highlighted, suggesting a focus on
appearance over a woman’s full potential.

STANZA WISE EXPLANATION

STANZA 1

Word Meaning:
Artifice : clever trick
Bonsai – A miniature tree grown in a container, carefully shaped and pruned to maintain its
small size.
Split : tear /break apart
Lightning- a powerful electrical discharge in the atmosphere

Explanation:
The miniature tree is planted in an attractive pot. The tree could have grown upto eight-feet-
tall if it had been planted in nature (along a mountainside). The full grown tree would have
been so strong that it could only be damaged by lightning.

STANZA 2

Word Meaning:
Pruned – cut off to make something smaller
Whittles – reduce something in size, amount, or extent by a gradual series of steps.
Croons – Sings in a soft, low voice.
Explanation:
But instead of letting the tree grow tall as per its nature, a gardener carefully trims the plant
so that the height of the plant is about nine inches only. Everyday, while trimming the
branches of the tree, the gardener sings softly.

STANZA 3

Word Meaning:
Cozy – comfortable
Explanation:
The gardener sings that nature has made the tree small and weak so that it can be grown
indoors and that the tree is lucky and fortunate to have a pot in which it can grow.
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STANZA 4

Word Meaning:
Dwarf – stunt

Explanation:
Restrictions must be imposed on living beings in their early stages to stop them from
growing to their full potential.
This stanza broadens the poem’s metaphor beyond just the bonsai tree. It suggests that the
act of restricting and controlling growth is applied widely to living things, not just plants. This
could refer to humans or animals trained for specific purposes or any living being on this
planet.

Stanza 5
Word Meaning:
Bound – held together
Crippled brain – suggestive of stunted mental growth
Curlers – a kind of roller to make hair curly
Explanation:
Like a tree, a woman from a very young age is kept in control. Here, the poet gives examples
of how their growth is hampered by binding their feet, brainwashing them and putting their
hair in curlers.

In the last line, the poet likely scolds the gardener for destroying what he loves to touch.
“Bound feet” is a historical reference to a practice in China where young girls’ feet were
bound to restrict their growth.

Title Analysis
Artifice is something created by skill, often in a way that deceives or misrepresents
something else. The poem uses the bonsai tree as a metaphor for individuals who are
shaped and controlled by societal expectations. This shaping process is an artifice because it
creates a restricted, unnatural version of what the individual could be. The gardener’s act of
pruning and the soothing words are a form of artifice, creating an illusion of care while
actually limiting the tree’s potential.
Hence, the title of the poem “A Work of Artifice” by American poet Marge Piercy is quite
appropriate.

Themes
Suppression of Women
The poem was composed at the height of the American Feminist movement in the 1970.
The bonsai tree in the poem is a potent symbol and represents suppression of women. The
poem opens with what could be the true potential of a tree-as a unwieldy eighty-feet-tall
tree on a mountainside that could be damaged only by lightning’. But women are likely to
have a ‘pot’ and grow to a height of a mere nine inches.
The poem is truly about how women are confined into their predetermined domestic role. It
is not just the size of the tree that the gardener trims, but its natural habitat as well. A small
bonsai tree in an attractive pot encourages the belief that women are desirable when they
are pretty, delicate and domestic. This conditioning begins very early, by their feet being
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bound, thoughts being manipulated and hair in curlers. It represents the oppression of
women, their inability to grow and how society has kept them tied to customs preventing
them from achieving their full potential.

Manipulation and Control

The gardener’s act of carefully pruning the tree represents the manipulative ways in which
society shapes and controls individuals. The gardener justifies these limitations as
beneficial, creating a false narrative about the tree’s nature.
The very concept of a bonsai tree is an example of manipulating nature to create a desired
aesthetic. This parallels the way women are pressured to conform to unrealistic beauty
standards.

Poetic Devices
Metaphor
A metaphor is a figure of speech that is used to make a comparison without using words
“like” and “as”.
A bonsai tree is a metaphor for women, who face inequality, discrimination and oppression.
The poet uses this to express that women have vast potential to grow and accomplish large
things but fail to do so as a result of the manipulations and suppression.
Personification
A figure of speech in which abstract ideas are invested with personality, and both inanimate
and abstract ideas are endowed with the attributes of living beings. The poet gives human
attributes to the bonsai by using words such as ” “brain”, and “hair”.
Symbolism
Symbolism is the use of symbols to represent ideas or qualities.

• Bonsai tree: Represents the individual restricted by societal expectations.

• Gardener: Represents societal forces that control and shape individuals.
• Pot: Represents the limitations placed on the individual’s potential.
• Bound feet, crippled brain, hair in curlers: These symbolize specific societal
practices that restrict individual growth, particularly for women.

Irony
The gardener’s words, “It is your nature to be small and cozy…how lucky, little tree,” are laced
with irony. He justifies the limitations as the tree’s natural state, while the reader
understands it’s an imposed condition.