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Chapter 55
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Testaments, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Religious Totalitarianism and Hypocrisy
Gender Roles
Truth, Knowledge, and Power
Shame, Fear, and Repression
Choice
Summary
Analysis
Agnes and Becka find Jade very untidy: she leaves her clothes lying around, she showers at “unauthorized” hours of the day until strongly told she must not, and her tattoo seems blasphemous. Agnes and Becka often hear loud thumping coming from Jade’s upstairs bedroom. When Agnes finally asks what she is doing, Jade explains that she’s exercising. Becka does not think that women need strong bodies, only men do, but Jade says women do, too, in case a man ever tries to force himself on her. She shows them how to throw a heartstopper punch. Both Becka and Agnes are worried by this, since hitting a man is strictly forbidden and if a woman is raped, she is partially to blame for enticing the man. Jade gives up the discussion but keeps working out.
Jade’s concept of personal safety, capability, and self-defense are entirely different from Becka and Agnes’s concept of such things, which highlights the disparity between their respective worlds. Jade’s belief that women should be strong and ready to fight any man who tries to take advantage reflects the comparative empowerment she’s experienced throughout her life. Becka and Agnes’s belief that they are to blame if any man tries to assault them reflects their deeply-entrenched belief in their own low value, even though they are growing and expanding in their roles as Aunts.
Themes
As Agnes continues to read the criminal files that appear on her desk, she wonders if her “soft, muddy brain” is beginning to harden like a man’s. This both excites and disturbs her. However, Agnes still does not have access to the genealogical archives where she could learn who her true mother is, and will not until after her missionary service as a Pearl Girl.
Agnes’s reflection on the state of her brain suggests that, despite learning to do all of the things that men do, her upbringing which taught her to view her own brain as less capable and powerful still has a major effect on her view of herself. This demonstrates the harmful effect of strictly enforced gender roles on a person’s psyche and self-concept.
Themes
One day, Agnes’s family’s genealogical record appears on her desk instead of a crime file. Agnes opens the genealogical file and finds her own record tucked in a separate file behind the rest of the family, since she is not a blood relative of any of them. She finds a picture of her birth mother, though the name is redacted, and beneath it the notations tell Agnes that she is a Mayday operative at large in Canada. Two unsuccessful assassination attempts have been made on her mother’s life. There is a picture of her father as well, his name also redacted, with notes that claim he is possibly a Mayday terrorist as well, though it is not known for sure. Agnes places her hand on her mother’s picture.
Although Agnes did love Tabitha, her first glimpse of her biological mother’s picture suggests that her absence left a hole in Agnes’s life that even Tabitha could not fill. The contrast between Agnes’s legal parents and her biological parents is striking—where once she believed she was the daughter of Gilead’s elite, now she discovers that she is the daughter of Mayday rebels, a group that is hated and feared in Gilead.
Themes
There is another page in Agnes’s file that informs her that she has a sister: Baby Nicole. There is a handwritten note attached that says Nicole is somewhere in Gilead, still at large. Agnes is overwhelmed, partly with gratitude but also with the gravity and danger of the situation. She’s assumed that Lydia is the one giving her these files, but she does not understand why. Looking around first, Agnes folds the picture of her mother into her robe and takes it with her out of the Reading Room.
Agnes’s implicit understanding that such information is extremely dangerous reiterates the manner in which Gilead limits information as much as possible and enforces its citizens’ ignorance, especially that of women. Such secrecy and enforced ignorance are marks of totalitarian regimes, such the free flow of information represents a threat to the regime’s narrative.
Themes
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