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Chapter 1
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 states that her audience has asked her to recount her childhood in Gilead, and remarks that she still has fond memories of some aspects of it, even though she thinks Gilead ought to fade away and is “surely contrary to what God intended.”
Agnes’s opinion that Gilead is not “what God intended” immediately establishes religious corruption and abuse of power as a primary theme within the novel. Although not much has been revealed about life in Gilead, Agnes’s words imply that although its citizenry may be devoutly religious, it is a corrupt, immoral society at its core.
Themes
As children, Agnes and her peers wear dresses color-coded to the season. They are careful that their hems and sleeves cover the proscribed length and do not show any skin, since men’s sexual urges are uncontrollable. According to Aunt Vidala (who is frightening and strict), if the little girls show too much skin, men may be overwhelmed by these urges. They will attack the girls, steal their “treasure” and their beauty, and tear off their little flower petals. Aunt Estée, who is kind, tries to soften this message and claims that men are not altogether so bad. But Agnes has nightmares about Aunt Vidala’s vision of assault and robbery and fears the day she will be arranged into a marriage.
Vidala’s fiery teaching and Agnes’s fears demonstrate the manner in which can be weaponized to sexually repress women from a young age, particularly by teaching them that they are responsible for the horrible actions and lack of self-control of others. Additionally, although Vidala seems to embody Gilead’s totalitarian and fearsome tendencies, Aunt Estée’s kindness suggests that even in such a wicked religious system, kind-hearted individuals may exist and even help uphold the system.
Themes
Agnes and her friends belong to the special class of girls from wealthy families, “pre-chosen” to some day marry Commanders or Sons of Jacob. Although Agnes does not think she is pretty, she feels especially “chosen” since her mother Tabitha often tells her a story about finding her in a castle, choosing her from a number of girls, and stealing her away through the forest at night, hiding from the witches. Agnes has a vague memory of being carried through the forest, so she wonders if the story might indeed be true. In any case, she loves Tabitha, and Tabitha loves her.
Agnes’s proximity to the most powerful individuals in Gilead allows the narrative to focus entirely on Gilead’s upper leadership and examine the power structures at play within such a tyrannical theocracy. If Agnes had been born a low-class individual, a common person, the framing of her relationship to certain powerful individuals would be even less equitable than it is now.
Themes
