The representation of females in literary Works is a polemical issue. They have often been associated with a misogynistic stereotype. I have chosen three literary texts to compare the descriptions of women; “Snow White”, “Sonnet 130” by William Shakespeare and “The Rape of the Lock” by Alexander Pope. This will draw attention to the way that women are often portrayed as we see the common ingredients in their descriptions, as well as any potential differences between them.
In both “Snow White” and “The Rape of the Lock” women are portrayed as vain and obsessed with their beauty. The speaker in “The Rape of the Lock” condemns the girl described, Belinda, for her obsession with appearances by mocking her through the use of hyperbole, for example calling her a “Goddess” (line 132). He writes about her in heroic couplets, a form often used for satirical or comical poetry. Belinda is also presented as immoral and impious, for example when she is performing “the sacred rites of pride (line 128), or with the enumeration of her cosmetics and several “Bibles” ( line 138), suggesting that to her, these things have the same value. The text “Snow White” condemns the second Queen by calling her “proud and haughty” (line 13) and presenting her as extremely jealous “she could not bear to be surpassed in beauty by anyone” (line 13). This exaggerated focus on beauty is ridiculous and a common way of making women look irrational and petty. “Snow White”, however, presents the good characters as beautiful, such as Little Snow-White being “fairer far to see”(line 26) and her mother being described as “a beautiful Queen” (line 2), sending a contradictory message as beauty is valued highly and equated with morality, but vanity or caring too much about ones beauty is presented as sinful. This reflects the pressure on women to try to be beautiful, but pretend not to value it.
“Sonnet