moira

what is represented by moira?

  • anti-establishment

  • anarchy/rebellion

  • subversion of expectations

    • gay

  • third-wave liberal feminism

    • ends up sexualised n objectified by men anyway

  • use of own name = rejection of Gileadean authority

  • “moi” - retention of identity

  • “the gold fingernail she wore to be eccentric” (ch7, pg43)

  • “a cigarette between her stubby yellow-ended fingers. let’s go for a beer” (ch7, pg43)

  • “let’s go for a beer… i had a paper due the next day” (ch7, pg43)

  • “moira and I, with paper bags filled with water. water bombs…dropping them on the heads of the boys below. it was moira’s idea.” (ch10, pg63)

  • “moira said later that it wasn’t real, it was done with models, but it was hard to tell” (ch20, pg124)

  • “Moira had mechanical ability, she used to fix her own car, the minor things” (ch22, pg 137)

  • “moira had power now, she’d been set loose, she’d set herself loose. she was now a loose woman” (ch22, pg139)

  • “moira was like an elevator with open sides, she made us dizzy” (ch22, pg139)

    • vertigo: potentially not a fear of heights but the terrifying nature of having free will

    • vertigo-inducing fantasy

  • “moira was our fantasy…in the light of moira, the aunts were less fearsome and more absurd” (ch23, pg139)

  • “if i were moira, i’d know how to take it apart, reduce it to its cutting edges” (ch28, pg176)

  • “she’d decided to prefer women” (ch28, pg176)

  • “you can’t help what you feel, Moira said once, but you can help how you behave” (ch29, pg198)

  • “moira laughed; she could always do that” (ch31, pg208)

  • “it mut be hard to stand there unclaimed” (ch37, pg247)

  • “ ‘…I made up a lot of stuff. You do that, when they use the electrodes and the other things” (ch38, pg252)

  • “as if they were festering sores. You know the way the Aunts look when they say the word man.” (ch38, pg253)

  • “she is frightening me now, because what I hear in her voice is indifference, a lack of volition. have they really done it to her then, taken away something - what? - that used to be so central to her?” (ch38, pg257)

  • “ ‘Butch paradise, you might call it. ‘ “ (ch38, pg257)

  • “Bodily functions at least remain democratic. Everybody shits, as Moira would say” (ch39, pg259)

potential types of questions:

  • her significance