The Paper Nautilus

“The Paper Nautilus” is a poem written by Modernist poet Marianne Moore. Originally available to readers in 1941, it was published in The Completed Poems of Marianne Moore in 1961. The poem speaks to the Naturalist movement, which finds meaning in nature and realism. Moore was known for her animal poems, and her background in the sciences provided her writing with an eye for observation, as seen in “The Paper Nautilus.”

The poem follows a single paper nautilus as she looks over her shell, which carries her eggs as they incubate. The speaker closely observes the paper nautilus and her interactions with her offspring, despite the challenges for sustaining her own life in the process. While the poem is about the creature in its element, the paper nautilus becomes a running metaphor for maternal instinct and for the process of creation in nature and in writing. Moore weaves together unique metaphors and similes, providing a depth to the paper nautilus’ actions in relation to humanity.

Moore was a poet who influenced the literary landscape, but who was also influenced by the landscape of art and technology of her time. Photography was becoming widely accessible, offering scenes and unimaginable images to an audience who would never see a paper nautilus in its habitat with their own eyes if not for such technology, and science was taking full advantage of this accessibility. Moore’s relationship to science and image is greatly tied to “The Paper Nautilus,” as is her love of animals, her maternal relationships, and the act of writing as a whole.

Poet Biography

Marianne Moore has a storied career as a poet. Born in 1887 in St. Louis, Missouri, Moore grew up in Pennsylvania and moved to New York City with her mother, immersing herself in the literary world first as a librarian and then as a writer. She began publishing her animal poetry while getting her BA in biology and histology at Bryn Mawr College. By 1921, she published Poems, her first volume of poetry, which was also arranged by H. D., which shows her early involvement in the literary world.

Moore worked as editor for Dial magazine from 1925 to 1929, a literary magazine influential at the time (Poetry Foundation). She continued to publish poetry collections, as well as prose essays and reviews of art, music, and food throughout her varied career. She published Observations (1924), Selected Poems (1935), and, in 1951, released Collected Poems, which won the Pulitzer Prize in poetry, the National Book Award, and the Bollingen Prize. Other awards and honors include “the Poetry Society of America’s Gold Medal for Distinguished Development, the National Medal for Literature, and an honorary doctorate from Harvard University” (PoetryFoundation.org).

Marianne Moore passed away in New York City in 1972.

Poem Text

Moore, Marianne. “The Paper Nautilus.” 1961. Poets.org.

Summary

Marianne Moore’s “The Paper Nautilus” is a poem about observing a sea animal as its eggs are released. The poem’s first stanza offers a comparison between humans as “authorities” who are “shaped” by mercenaries” (Lines 1-2), and “writers” who are ensnared in their egotistical human “comforts” (Lines 3, 5). The speaker states “Not for these” (Line 5) does this creature produce her “thin glass shell” (Line 7), which holds its many eggs.

The second stanza continues to describe the nautilus and its shell, inside and out, it’s “dull / white outside” (Lines 9-10) and an “inner surface / glossy as the sea” (Lines 11-12). The speaker depicts the nautilus’ maternal act of “watching” over her eggs like a “guard” (Lines 12-13). At all hours, the nautilus forgoes eating to take care of her offspring until they are ready. The third stanza continues the in-depth look into the shape of the nautilus, her eight arms wrapping the shell in a protective hug, hidden and safe beneath her careful strength.

The end of Stanza 3 extends into Stanza 4, where the shell is compared to Hercules, a classical Greek Roman mythical figure, who is not as successful as the paper nautilus. Once the eggs are set free, the shell is also freed from the nautilus’ grip, leaving behind its “wasp-nest flaws” (Line 27). The poem closes on another Greek image, arms clinging to the mane of the Parthenon horse and its “close- / laid Ionic chiton folds…” (Lines 28-29), referencing the shell and its “fortress” of love and protection.