MOIRA

“This is a loony bin”

CH13

• AO2: disrespectful and casual → refusal to submit

“It makes me feel safer, that Moira is here”

CH13

• clear that Moira offers Offred safety and comfort in the dire situation

• Maybe because she’s more rebellious or maybe just because she’s someone recognisable

“I couldn’t stand the thought of her not being here, with me. For me”

CH15

• AO2: transition to Gilead, Offred is almost selfish in her passiveness, she wants Moira to be passive too to stay there with her. Makes the reader question whether Offred has Moira’s best interests at heart, but also whether this is just a natural human reaction when in this position?

“I touched my own fingers to them, quickly, held on. Let go.”

CH15

• AO2: the touch keeps Offred grounded before she starts to become intangible when she no longer has this human connection

“Moira is no longer with us, she said at last”

CH22

• AO2: euphemistic → Aunt phrases in a way that shows Moira doesn’t support Gilead

“Moira was like an elevator with open sides.”

CH22

• AO2: metaphor → dangerous but mysterious

• AO2: shows how Offred is frightened by the idea of rebellion

“Moira didn’t reappear. She hasn’t yet.”

CH22

• AO2: as readers we want Moira to be free

• AO2: double meaning? → the old Moira never reappears, Jezebels Moira is a different person, Offred is still hoping for the old Moira back

“They don’t want us going anywhere, you can bet on that”

CH28

• AO2: Offred describes Moira as almost “gleeful” here which relates to how Moira is smart in her realisation of the introduction of Gilead

• AO2: the final big changes of the law come at once in order to remove the escape routes

“Idiot, says Moira”

CH36

• AO2: opposite to Offred

• AO2: Offred uses Moira as her conscious

• AO2: this is the final time that Moira is a symbol

“It’s strapless, wired from the inside, pushing up the breasts, but it doesn’t quite fit Moira.”

CH37

• AO2: sex and power can go hand in hand → patriarchal over objectified norms

• AO2: double meaning → literally doesn’t fit but also Offred hopes Moira doesn’t want to fit this idea

• AO2: the feminine costume contrasts Moira’s masculine lesbian role

“why are rabbits supposed to be sexually attractive to men?”

CH37

• AO3: Rabbits are avid breeders → a reminder of fertility

“Moira begins to saunter off… I get up, wobble across the room”

CH37

• AO2: contrast between the two may show how Offred is codependent on men, as here she doesn’t have the commander to steady her whereas Moira doesn’t need a man to steady her

• AO2: Offred is also metaphorically off balance as she is uncomfortable

“My arms go around her, the wires propping up her breasts dig into my chest”

CH37

• AO2: literally and metaphorically uncomfortable

“You look like the Whore of Babylon… You look like something the cat dragged in”

CH37

• AO2: still have the same humour → shows the value of friendships

“There might have been objections to what they were doing, even then”

CH38

• AO2: Moira acknowledges that not many people would’ve objected to what was happening

“I had my choice, they said, this or the colonies”

CH38

• AO2: if there’s only 2 options then it’s not a choice → relates to what Offred says earlier

“So here I am. They even give you face cream. You should figure out some way of getting in here.”

CH38

• AO2: face cream for the male gaze

• AO2: disheartening that this is from Moira

• AO2: how Gilead has undone Moira’s symbolism

“I don’t know how she ended, or even if she did, because I never saw her again”

CH38

• AO2: disappointing and underwhelming ending that isn’t what we wanted for Moira → worse than her dying

• “Bodily functions at least remain democratic. Every body shits, as Moira would say”

CH39

• AO2: anti-establishment comment on equality

• AO2: referral to Moira in the past tense