Chapters 30-39 Questions

Answer ALL of the following questions about chapters 30-39 in blue font.

1. What is the password that Ofglen shares with Offred? Why is this significant? Look back at their early interactions – how is it clear now that Ofglen was feeling Offred out to see if she was a part of the resistance?

2. Why does Offred say, “Context is all” on two separate occasions? (144, 192)

3. There has been a cat motif in the novel so far. Trace the development of this motif and explain what meaning Atwood might want us to make of this motif. Consider the problem with the cat in Offred’s memory of the pre-escape attempt to Canada as well as other references to cats and kitties throughout the text.

4. What proposition/suggestion/request/command does Serena Joy make to Offred when they are sitting in the garden? What early evidence foreshadows this?

5. Why open Chapter 33 with imagery of the dandelion flower: how does it correlate to the rest of the chapter?

6. What invalidated the marriage between Luke and Offred and forced her into this position in the first place, even making it possible for her daughter to be taken from her?

7. What has happened with Janine and her child? What is common knowledge throughout the network about Janine and the child’s conception?

8. What is the difference in the way Offred and the Commander view love?

9. How does the Commander justify the existence of the club where he takes Offred?

10. What does Offred learn about the women at the hotel? Who is the woman at the door of the Ladies’ room? Who are the majority of the other women? How did they come to be there?

11. According to the films shown to Moira, what is life like in the Colonies? Who does Moira see in the videos about the Colonies?

12. As Offred explores the hotel room, as she once did when she waited for Luke, how is everything the same and yet so different?