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Richard Griffen
Reenie is Iris and Laura’s nursemaid and the housekeeper at Avilion. Overall, she serves as a kind of mother figure to Iris and Laura, particularly after the death of their biological mother, Liliana. At the beginning of the novel, Reenie is presented as a rather conservative figure: she regularly chastises Iris and Laura when their behavior falls short of the strict standards of respectability. Despite being from a working-class background herself, Reenie also aligns herself with the class position of her employers, the Chase family, when the workers in Port Ticonderoga begin striking and rioting during the Great Depression. Indeed, Reenie is deeply loyal, and as the novel progresses she shows a more rebellious side, helping Laura run away from Richard and sleep in Avilion after she has nowhere else to go. Particularly after both of Iris’s parents die, Iris longs for Reenie as the only person she trusts to take care of her. Reenie eventually marries Ron Hincks and has a daughter, Myra. Reenie dies from kidney failure.
Reenie Quotes in The Blind Assassin
The The Blind Assassin quotes below are all either spoken by Reenie or refer to Reenie. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 3
Quotes
She wasn’t married, she was married off, said Reenie, rolling out the gingersnaps. The family arranged it. That’s what was done in such families, and who’s to say it was any worse or better than choosing for yourself? In any case, Adelia Montfort did her duty, and lucky to have the chance, as she was getting long in the tooth—she must have been twenty-three, which was counted as over the hill in those days.
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And then, after the wedding, there was the war. Love, then marriage, then catastrophe. In Reenie’s version, it seemed inevitable.
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Chapter 5
Quotes
Not only were they outside agitators, they were foreign outside agitators, which was somehow more frightening. Small dark men with moustaches, who’d signed their names in blood and sworn to be loyal unto death, and who would start riots and stop at nothing, and set bombs and creep in at night and slit our throats while we slept (according to Reenie). These were their methods, these ruthless Bolsheviks and union organizers, who were all the same at heart (according to Elwood Murray). They wanted Free Love, and the destruction of the family, and the deaths by firing squad of anyone who had money—any money at all—or a watch, or a wedding ring. This was what had been done in Russia. So it was said.
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Get the entire The Blind Assassin LitChart as a printable PDF.
Reenie Quotes in The Blind Assassin
The The Blind Assassin quotes below are all either spoken by Reenie or refer to Reenie. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 3
Quotes
She wasn’t married, she was married off, said Reenie, rolling out the gingersnaps. The family arranged it. That’s what was done in such families, and who’s to say it was any worse or better than choosing for yourself? In any case, Adelia Montfort did her duty, and lucky to have the chance, as she was getting long in the tooth—she must have been twenty-three, which was counted as over the hill in those days.
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And then, after the wedding, there was the war. Love, then marriage, then catastrophe. In Reenie’s version, it seemed inevitable.
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Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 5
Quotes
Not only were they outside agitators, they were foreign outside agitators, which was somehow more frightening. Small dark men with moustaches, who’d signed their names in blood and sworn to be loyal unto death, and who would start riots and stop at nothing, and set bombs and creep in at night and slit our throats while we slept (according to Reenie). These were their methods, these ruthless Bolsheviks and union organizers, who were all the same at heart (according to Elwood Murray). They wanted Free Love, and the destruction of the family, and the deaths by firing squad of anyone who had money—any money at all—or a watch, or a wedding ring. This was what had been done in Russia. So it was said.
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