Let’s Call Her Barbie
Can an 11 ½” doll have a “coming of age”? In this case, maybe, because that’s what Rosen’s ambitious novel feels like. In the 1940s, two friends (Matt & Elliot) made dollhouse furniture from wood scraps. By 1956 Mattel boasted an Ivy League engineering and development team, led by genius Jack Ryan. When Ruth Handler, Elliot’s wife and CEO, brings a Bild Lilli doll to a board meeting, the concept of marketing a “doll with tits” that looks “like a hooker” is a huge joke to the all-male team. Only baby dolls were being produced at the time, but Ruth’s vision was bold and courageous—if boys could be given toy guns and soldiers, symbols of manhood, why couldn’t girls aspire to more than husbands and babies? A very personal feel runs through Rosen’s story of Barbie’s growing pains, and stumbling rise to fame —apart from hundreds of redesigns, the anatomically impossible, visually-proportioned female shape had to accommodate fabric thickness and textures; and individually hand-painted makeup, lacquered nails and rooting of each strand of hair is all quite mind-boggling and engrossing.
Ruth’s innovative vision grows with the politically changing times as the story moves into the ´60s and ´70s; women’s discontent with being overlooked and ignored; Vietnam protests; the moon landing (Barbie launched Mattel into the stratosphere four years earlier); and the sexual revolution and objectification of the female body, resulting in a barrage of hate mail. Rosen deep dives into the psychology of driven business execs, Ruth’s inability to exert control in the home, and family and business relationships pivotal to Mattel’s success. Jack Ryan’s sex-drugs-and-rock-and-roll lifestyle did feel overworked at times, but understanding Jack is crucial to grasping how Barbie stayed on track as a treasured feminine icon, while new designers tried to subvert and sexualise her. I’ve never owned a Barbie, but was deeply invested in this extraordinary story.
