If you are the sort of reader who sits with a pen to mark lines that sound interesting, don’t do it with this book, you will end up marking too much! Witticism, aphorism and humour abound here. Atwood’s sentences breathe out ideas, nothing is dead or redundant, an impossible feat for a book of 640 pages.
Vitals are straight: postmodernist historical fiction, triple-story-setting of novel within the novel and significant scoops of science fiction.
Atwood has worked out a dense pattern, without cluttering or smudging the design. She uses a variety of tools: Newspaper articles, society gossip notes, letters and notices. It creates an impression of verisimilitude no doubt, but also serves the greater purpose of breaking the monotony of prose that is bound to creep into a long narrative. Atwood has focused on saving her story from ennui. She saves the finale right upto the end where it is revealed in a crescendo. As a result, it is hard to put the book down. The author does not hide her intension for it to be so. The name of the protagonists in the novel that runs within the novel are not divulged. So a thick layer of delectable mystery is whipped up. It is like a drizzle which films the landscape of the story and contributes to its beauty. It is a question worth considering if the novel can be read as a thriller because that is the dominant emotion that it generates. However, what dims its appeal as a thriller is the detailed socio-political history and character evolution that is woven into the pattern.
The first frame of this multi-layered novel is that of a memoir being written by 82-year-old Iris. Within this appears another eponymous novel whose protagonists are referred to as merely ‘he’ and ‘she’ The third frame is of an unfinished science fiction narrated by ‘him‘ to ‘her’ and later written for a magazine.
The other pivot around which the novel quietly hinges is its endearing description of childhood and old age. In a major part of the narrative an old Iris talks to the reader through her memoir. She is physically wilted but her mind is agile. She shares asides and conspiratorial laughs with her reader striking a bond. For a woman of her age and experiences, Iris is surprisingly and convincingly, free of malice and bitterness. Her voice is of final surrender and at the same time childlike naughtiness.
“If I ever get caught in high wind my hair will all blow off like dandelion fluff, leaving only a tiny pockmarked nubbin of bald head.”
Childhood too, though ridden with death and downfall, is not deprived of its moments of sheer innocence. This part being allocated to the enigmatic character of Laura.
"Think twice, said Reenie. Laura said, Why only twice?"
Iris describes her little sister’s character as being like ‘tone –deaf’, someone who heard and saw things in a different light. Her innocence is both amusing and annoying as it is to Iris. Iris on the other hand is assigned the task of taking care of herself and her sister by her dying mother and later by her father. Not too willingly though, she must now stick by Laura for whom truth becomes increasingly difficult to decipher.
“Laura found a splotch of blood on my bedsheets and began to weep. She concluded that I was dying. I would die like Mother, She sobbed, without telling her first. I would have a little grey baby like a kitten then I would die.
I told her not to be an idiot. I said this blood had nothing to do with babies. (Callista hadn't gone into that part having no doubt decided that too much of this kind of information at once might wrap my psyche)”
While the book on one hand traces the relationship and life of the two sisters, it also on the other hand follows the downfall of two prominent houses: the Chase of Port Ticonderoga and the Griffin of Toronto. Atwood herself clarifies that the book is essentially about two things: Human sacrifice and writing. It circles around the popular notion that artist is the one who suffers and sacrifices, thus the candles on Laura’s grave, who is believed to be the author of The Blind Assassin.
Among other themes is the historic setting which covers over hundred years of Canadian history including the two World Wars, depression and communist witch hunting. Feminism is the other silent thread in the book that weaves together the women of different times and the attitude of men towards them. However, the author does not allow the issue to weigh down the narrative.
“Boats are female for Walter, as are busted car engines and broken lamps and radios-items of any kind that can be fiddled with by men adroit with gadgetry, and restored to a condition as good as new.”
The story that is narrated by the clandestine lover to his beloved also draws from real world evils like child labour, class differences and corruption. It also subtly and metaphorically builds on their own lives.
“This is how the girl who couldn’t speak and the man who couldn’t see fell in love.”
The girl who couldn’t speak would directly correspond with Iris who had to surrender to silence in her marriage and the man who couldn’t see would automatically be Alex who could not see what he was headed for ideologically. These symbols are however lost to the reader till the end since the narrative is structured like a puzzle, and can be understood only on a second reading. This brings us to the most important question: Who is the Blind Assasin? The answer is Iris herself because she is the one who ultimately “saves” Laura through the book which she writes in her name, not only making her an icon but also avenging her death.
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