Motherhood In Anne Bradstreet's The Author To Her Book

In Anne Bradstreet’s book, “The Author to Her Book,” a poem is metaphorically written about the struggles faced in motherhood. The author compares her book to a child, that she is later unsatisfied with, although her friends think it is good. The author tries to care for it, protect it, and wash its face just like a mother would care for her child. The mother (author) is far from perfect when it comes to parenting skills for this child (book). She feels as if her book will never be written the way she wants it. Therefore, her friends decide to steal the book and publish it, which makes the author frustrated. Since the book is soon to be published the author decides to just go ahead and try to fix it up. After multiple tries she is forced to realize that her book will never be perfect because she cares too much about it, just like a mother would care about her child. Therefore, symbolism can be seen in the idea of a mother and her
The speaker uses a metaphor, about a mother and her child that she gave birth to, to symbolize the relationship between an author and her book. For example, the poem begins by talking about the “child” having blemishes all over her body, which explains how the author feels about her own imperfections (12). The author wants to ignore the child, but like a mother is unable to because it is her child that she wants to take care of and clean up its flaws. When the publisher returns the book to the author, she attempts to perfect it, stating, “I washed thy face, but more defects I saw” (line 13). The author is trying to be a better mom to her child (book). However, the more and more the author tries to improve to quality of her book, she finds that she has only worsened the image of her. As a mother she realizes washing the child and trying to make all of the blemishes disappear does not work because just like her own imperfection, they both run too deep to be