The Handmaid's Tale, #2
The Testaments
by Margaret Atwood
Contents
1
Overview
A senior Aunt recalls the unveiling of her flattering yet crowded statue and the rivalries surrounding it. Years later, she begins a clandestine manuscript in Ardua Hall’s library, acknowledging surveillance and potential denunciations. The chapter establishes her authority, hypocrisy, and resolve to reveal buried truths despite personal risk.
Summary
The chapter opens with the senior Aunt describing her statue at Ardua Hall, awarded while she is still alive and unveiled by the resentful Aunt Vidala. She notes its idealized features and the staged figures around her—child, Handmaid, and Pearl Girl—along with a Taser that reminds her of imperfect persuasion.
She critiques the sculptress’s style and the distorted busts of Aunt Helena, Aunt Vidala, and Aunt Elizabeth, recalling the unveiling where she chose to appear benevolent to spare the nervous artist. Nine years pass; the statue weathers, and votaries leave symbolic offerings. She ignores soggy breads but pockets the refreshing oranges.
Shifting to the present, the Aunt writes secretly in Ardua Hall’s library, one of the few to survive widespread book burnings meant to erase the past. She reflects that their own regime’s “fingerprints” stain that past, and she feels compelled to exhume buried truths for an unknown reader, if any exist.
She acknowledges the physical strain of writing and the danger of being discovered, noting she herself placed the surveillance cameras she now avoids. Aware that rivals within Ardua Hall would seize her pages, she continues nonetheless, concluding with a silent warning to them that what follows will be even more damning.
Who Appears
- Narrator (senior Aunt)High-ranking Aunt with a public statue; begins a secret manuscript, evades surveillance, and plans to expose buried truths.
- Aunt VidalaRival Aunt who read the statue’s citation; depicted with hostility and a distorted bust.
- SculptressElderly true believer who created the statue; anxious for approval; later deceased.
- Aunt HelenaAunt whose bust appears rabid due to the sculptress’s style.
- Aunt ElizabethAunt whose bust seems ready to explode; example of the sculptress’s excess.