Chapter 21 – Alias Grace: Summary and Analysis
⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.
Summary
Simon Jordan leaves the Governor’s wife’s house after hearing Grace describe Mary Whitney’s death. The story disturbs him deeply; he feels he has just witnessed a slaughter. He reflects on the limits of his own surgical training and the need for detachment. Walking by the lakeshore, he spots Grace returning to prison with guards. He then heads to Reverend Verringer’s for an early supper. Verringer questions Simon about his progress with Grace. Simon recounts the episode of Mary Whitney’s death and the subsequent hysterics and amnesia. Verringer suggests that Grace may have a history of such lapses. Simon raises concerns about Mrs. Moodie’s written account of the case, pointing out inaccuracies in names, dates, and details. Verringer warns Simon that Mrs. Moodie is known to embroider and has recently become involved with Spiritualists. He advises Simon to consult Grace’s former lawyer, Kenneth MacKenzie. The Governor’s wife and her daughter Lydia arrive for supper. Lydia presses Simon to address the Tuesday circle on the subject of asylum reform, and Simon reluctantly agrees, aware that he was swayed by Lydia’s charm. That night, he has an uneasy erotic dream involving white cloth and a woman’s hair.
Key Events
- Simon leaves the interview with Grace feeling shaken, comparing the experience to emerging from an abattoir.
- He observes Grace being escorted back to prison and reflects on the incongruity of her daytime freedom and nighttime confinement.
- At Verringer’s house, Simon details Grace’s account of Mary Whitney’s death and the subsequent fit of hysterics and memory loss.
- Verringer questions the reliability of Mrs. Moodie’s published narrative, pointing out factual errors and her tendency toward melodrama.
- Verringer recites part of Mrs. Moodie’s poem “The Maniac,” illustrating her literary flair and lack of strict accuracy.
- Simon agrees to speak to the Tuesday circle about asylum reform, swayed by Lydia’s presence and charm.
- That night Simon has a vivid, disturbing dream of being entangled in a woman’s hair that feels like white cloth.
Character Development
Simon Jordan is profoundly unsettled by Grace’s story of Mary Whitney’s death. His earlier professional detachment cracks as he identifies the dead girl as a victim of both the medical system and class exploitation. His memory of kissing a nursemaid as a boy shows a nascent awareness of the power dynamics between masters and servants. His reluctant agreement to address the Tuesday circle, driven by Lydia’s beauty, reveals his susceptibility to feminine influence and his desire for social approval. The final dream suggests repressed sexual tension and a subconscious linking of female bodies with suffocating entrapment.
Reverend Verringer emerges as a shrewd, slightly cynical observer. He is aware of Mrs. Moodie’s unreliability and dismisses Spiritualism, aligning himself with a rational, though religious, worldview. He steers Simon toward legal rather than literary sources.
Mrs. Moodie is established as an unreliable narrator whose dramatic embellishments (bloodshot eyes, fanciful poems) distort the truth of Grace’s case. Verringer’s criticism casts doubt on popular accounts of the murders.
Themes, Symbols, or Motifs
Memory and Trauma. Grace’s amnesia following Mary Whitney’s death suggests a traumatic dissociation. Simon suspects that Grace’s abundant recollections may hide a central, missing fact—a grave covered with flowers.
Unreliable Narration. The chapter explicitly debates the trustworthiness of testimony. Neither Grace nor Mrs. Moodie can be taken at face value. Verringer’s remark that “embroidery” is a female tendency underscores the gendered suspicion of women’s narratives.
Class and Gender. Simon’s memory of the nursemaid he kissed—and his inability to recall her name—illustrates how upper-class men exploit and forget servant women. Mary Whitney’s death is tied to her low social status and lack of medical care.
Doctors as Sculptors. Simon recalls Dr. Bransby Cooper’s analogy of the surgeon as a sculptor who must detach from the patient’s humanity. This ideal fails Simon when confronted with Grace’s story, pointing to the cost of emotional distance.
Spiritualism vs. Rationalism. Verringer’s disdain for Spiritualist table-turnings reflects the tension between emerging psychiatric science and supernatural belief systems. The chapter sets up a potential clash between these worldviews.
Why This Chapter Matters
Chapter 21 deepens the novel’s central question: who can we believe? By comparing Grace’s testimony to Mrs. Moodie’s account, Atwood foregrounds the difficulty of extracting historical truth from contradictory sources. Simon’s shaken composure indicates that even trained professionals are not immune to the emotional weight of others’ suffering. The chapter also advances the subplot of Simon’s social ambitions through the Verringer supper party and his entanglement with Lydia, which will complicate his investigation. The dream sequence provides a rare window into Simon’s inner desires and forewarns of the erotic and psychological traps ahead.
Study Questions and Answers
1. Why does Simon think Grace’s detailed memory might be a distraction?
Simon suspects that the overwhelming abundance of Grace’s recollections—every “button and candle-end”—could be a way of drawing attention away from a hidden but essential fact. He compares it to planting flowers over a grave, implying that there is a buried truth she is avoiding.
2. What specific inaccuracies does Simon find in Mrs. Moodie’s account?
Simon points out that Mrs. Moodie misnames locations and individuals, gives Mr. Kinnear an undeserved military rank, and claims the bodies were cut into quarters—a detail too sensational for the newspapers to have omitted. He doubts her portrayal of Grace’s motive as pure jealousy.
3. How does the dream at the end of the chapter reflect Simon’s psychological state?
The dream begins with innocent play (catching laundry) but turns into suffocation as the white cloth becomes a woman’s hair wrapping around his neck. This mirrors Simon’s growing entanglement with Grace and Lydia: what he finds alluring also threatens to strangle him. The erotic charge suggests that his professional investigation is becoming personally dangerous.