Point of View

The poem is primarily written from the third-person perspective of an unknown narrator who describes Corinna's behaviors as she prepares herself for bed. This point of view creates distance between the reader and Corinna, and refuses to allow Corinna any interiority. Such a lack of interiority underscores Swift's investment in both disgusting the reader and providing satirical critique; that Corinna's thoughts and emotions are not directly expressed emphasizes how readers must judge her simply from her exterior behavior.

At the end of the poem, the speaker shifts into a first-person, saying, "How shall I describe her arts / To recollect the scattered parts?" (65-66). Here, as the speaker describes Corinna's realization that her life has been upended by vermin, he expresses his own amazement at her plight by violating the rules of the poem already established. Instead of maintaining the distant third-person perspective, the speaker cannot...