Oppression vs. Resistance Theme Analysis

The world in which The Blind Assassin is set is stricken with inequality and oppression: economic exploitation, social class divisions, and sexism. While the novel’s main focus is on the forms of oppression that exist in small-town Canada in the 1930s and ‘40s, where most of the narrative is set, these forms of oppression are highlighted via their connection to the science-fiction story composed by the unnamed man in Iris’s novel, The Blind Assassin. In this story, which is set in a city called Sakiel-Norn on a planet named Zycron, there are two classes: the Ygnirods, who are “smallholders, serfs, and slaves,” and the elite Snilfards. The oppression and exploitation on Sakiel-Norn may initially appear more extreme than anything that exists on Earth; however, through interspersing stories of Zycron with the main narrative, Atwood suggests that there are actually more similarities than one might initially assume. The novel’s exploration of oppression is rather bleak and the acts of resistance that take place within it are almost all squashed. Ultimately, Atwood argues that while the will to resist is difficult to quash entirely, it is rarely possible to overpower the larger and more powerful forces of oppression. 

The lives of both Iris and Laura provide the novel’s main examples of gender-based oppression, as well as instances of resistance to sexism (albeit ones that usually backfire or fail). Starting from when the sisters are both young, their lives are highly controlled and they have little independence. As Iris and Laura grow older, they both find that their agency is restricted by men—particularly by Richard, whom Iris and Laura’s father, Norval, pressures Iris to marry after the family’s button business fails. As the wife of a wealthy and powerful businessman, Iris finds herself having to subscribe to extremely strict social rules and expectations. Even worse, Iris married Richard in part because Norval told her that it would help protect Laura from the perils of financial ruin and degraded social status in the future. Yet, soon after the marriage, Richard betrays his promise to help Norval’s business, and later in life, Iris discovers that Richard raped Laura repeatedly over many years and that he forced Laura to have an abortion when she became pregnant. While the restrictions placed on Iris are bad enough, Laura’s fate at the hands of Richard conveys the most gruesome side of gender-based oppression.

Both Laura and Iris perform acts of resistance to the oppression they face, but ultimately this is not enough to overpower the forces that restrict them. The most important among these is their decision to hide the union organizer Alex Thomas in their attic after the riot triggered by workers at the button factory. In doing so, they violate not only the expectations placed on them as women, but also as members of the upper class—they are supposed to protect their own interests rather than sympathize with a “known subversive and radical” like Alex. This makes the girls feel free, empowered, and in control for the first time in their lives. Yet however transformative the decision to shelter Alex is on the sisters’ personal lives, it is ultimately powerless against the larger forces of oppression acting on them. Moreover, Iris’s second major act of resistance is not as courageous as it could have been, as it rests on a falsehood. She publishes her novel, The Blind Assassin, despite knowing it will provoke scandal due to the fact that it depicts a secret affair between an unmarried man and woman. However, this triumphant act is mitigated by the fact that Iris publishes the novel under Laura’s name—and Laura, by that point, is already dead. This helps Iris evade the consequences of the scandal by implying that it was the unmarried Laura, rather than the married Iris, who had an affair with Alex. Iris’s act of resistance is therefore not as powerful as it otherwise would be.

The oppression and resistance that take place in the main section of the narrative are contrasted against that depicted by the man in his science-fiction story. To some readers, it may seem as if the oppression that takes place in Sakiel-Norn is far worse than anything that occurs in Iris and Laura’s hometown of Port Ticonderoga, Canada. In this alien city, the lowest class of Ygnirods are enslaved. Ygnirod children are forced to make carpets until they go blind, and the elite Snilfards boast about how many children were killed in the making of their carpets: “This carpet blinded ten children […] This blinded fifteen, this twenty.” Yet while this oppression that takes place within the man’s story might seem extreme, the novel also hints at the similarities between this science-fictional world and pre-war Canada. For example, fact that the enslaved Ygnirod children make carpets is significant, as in the main narrative, both Norval and Richard build their wealth by owning factories in the textile industry. Furthermore, in both societies, upper-class women are subject to particular codes of behavior that do not apply to the lower classes. Snilfard women, for example, cover their faces, while it is illegal for Ygnirods to do the same. Meanwhile, Iris finds that after she marries Richard, she experiences increased scrutiny over her behavior and she feels pressured follow unstated rules as to what she can and can’t do. Walking around Toronto, she thinks, “In theory I could go wherever I liked, in practice there were invisible barriers.”

The similarities between Canada and Sakiel-Norn make sense given that the man who writes the science-fiction story is a radical leftist. The man emphasizes that the Ygnirods want to rebel, but—like Iris and Laura—these aliens struggle to overcome the powerful forces oppressing them: “The Ygnirods were resentful of their lot in life, but concealed this with a pretense of stupidity. Once in a while they would stage a revolt, which would then be ruthlessly suppressed.” While the desire to resist may be an inevitable result of oppression, the novel suggests that the suppression of resistance is an even greater guarantee.