Prosthetics (Symbol)
The speaker repeatedly asks the applicant whether he has prosthetic body parts, such as a glass eye, in order to ascertain whether he is "missing" something. Prosthetics, then, symbolize unmet emotional or practical needs. Thus, by implying that a wife will be most helpful for a man with prosthetics, the speaker also implies that the job of a wife is to help meet those needs—operating as something of a prosthetic or medicine herself. By using these disability aids as a symbol for male needs, Plath also pokes fun at a consumerist culture obsessed with both normative gender roles and physical perfection, and interested in seeking both through the buying of goods.
The Suit (Symbol)
The applicant is evidently naked when he appears at his interview, and the speaker offers him a suit. The suit comes to represent the man and masculine gender roles. The speaker emphasizes that the suit offers protection and coverage, even though it is generic, black, and stiff. Thus, it not only symbolizes masculinity, but specific expectations of male guardedness, invulnerability, and emotional opacity. By having the speaker offer this symbol of masculine roles as part of a marriage-related conversation, Plath posits that men are primarily subject to restrictive gender roles within the institution of marriage.
Interviews (Motif)
Though this poem focuses on the question of whether the applicant will get married, its setting is atypical for narratives of romance, sex, or domesticity—it takes place in the context of an interview, borrowing language from the world of business and commerce. Through this conceit, Plath lays bare the essentially transactional nature of the applicant's (potential) marriage. She argues that the stereotypically crass and practical commercial realm is not separate from the stereotypically feminine domestic one, and indeed that it is only because of the wife's constant labor that the husband is able to endure public life. Furthermore, by replacing the soft language of romance with the harder and more direct language of commerce, Plath gives her speaker leave to speak harshly and even threateningly—thus suggesting that people marry because of fear or manipulation rather than love.
