Chapter summaries The Margaret Atwood 4-Book Bundle Margaret Atwood

Chapter 34: Miss Violence – 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

Iris and Laura Chase are educated at home by a series of tutors, whom they deliberately drive away using cold stares or feigned ignorance. The sisters prefer exploring the town of Port Ticonderoga, ignoring Reenie’s warnings about criminals and white slavers, inspired by pulp magazines smuggled in by one of Reenie’s brothers. They encounter factory workers’ children who sometimes throw stones but never hit them. At home, the tutor Miss Violet Goreham – nicknamed “Miss Violence” by Iris – lasts longer because she lets the girls do as they please. Lessons take place in the library, where Iris reads poetry, history, and novels while Laura colours pictures, often assigning strange colours. Miss Goreham encourages poetic recitation but is generally passive. The chapter culminates with Iris turning thirteen; her father begins to enforce strict discipline on her posture, dress, and behaviour, aimed at suppressing any emerging sexuality. Iris experiences her first menstruation, initially mistaking it for a fatal disease. Callista and Reenie explain it in different ways. Laura weeps, thinking Iris will die like their mother. The chapter ends with a description of a studio portrait in which both girls wear identical dark velvet dresses and forced smiles.

Key Events

  • Iris and Laura systematically discourage each new tutor by staring at their foreheads or pretending to be deaf, hoping to be left alone.
  • The sisters sneak into town despite Reenie’s fears, drawn by pulp magazines with stories of romance, outer space, and detective crime.
  • They observe the local school from a fence but feel thankful they do not have to attend, though also excluded.
  • Miss Violet Goreham arrives as tutor; Iris nicknames her “Miss Violence” in private, a name that sticks with Laura.
  • Lessons involve Iris reading aloud from Longfellow, Tennyson, Fitzgerald’s Rubáiyát, and others, while Laura colours illustrations with improvised palettes.
  • Miss Goreham pastes tinsel stars on the girls’ work and leads wildflower-pressing expeditions.
  • Iris turns thirteen; her father criticises her posture, speech, and dress, demanding neatness, obedience, and no visible sexuality.
  • Iris experiences her first period, thinking she is dying; Callista laughs and explains it as “my friend,” while Reenie calls it “the curse.”
  • Laura finds blood on the sheets and weeps, convinced Iris will die like their mother.
  • A family portrait is taken, showing both girls in identical velvet dresses with forced smiles under their father’s scrutiny.

Character Development

  • Iris Chase: Emerges as a rebellious, imaginative child who enjoys subverting authority (nicknaming Miss Violence) and reading material that expands her worldview. Her puberty marks a turning point: she becomes the target of her father’s repressive discipline, and she gains biological knowledge that distances her from Laura. Her desire to reclaim the “pointless afternoons” of childhood signals nostalgia for lost freedom.
  • Laura Chase: Remains childlike and willful. She refuses to accept that she will someday menstruate, insisting an exception will be made for her. Her colouring choices (e.g., blue trees, purple faces) hint at a nonconformist perspective. She shows emotional vulnerability when she weeps for Iris, linking blood to death.
  • Miss Violet Goreham (Miss Violence): A faded, gentle woman who lacks authority but offers the girls intellectual and emotional freedom through poetry, scrapbooks, and stars. She embodies “hopeless melancholy” and Victorian delicacy, fitting the decaying grandeur of Avilion. Her departure is tearful but not mourned by the girls.
  • Father (Captain Chase): His sudden strictness over Iris’s posture and clothing reflects his discomfort with her emerging sexuality. He wishes she were a boy, revealing a preference for control and masculine order.
  • Reenie and Callista: Provide contrasting explanations of menstruation – Reenie Presbyterian and practical, Callista modern and dismissive – showing the limited, gendered knowledge available to Iris.

Themes, Symbols, or Motifs

  • Childhood Freedom vs. Adult Control: The sisters’ unsupervised roaming and resistance to tutors contrast sharply with their father’s attempt to “take in hand” Iris at puberty. The forced smiles in the portrait symbolise the imposition of societally approved femininity.
  • The Power of Naming and Language: Iris’s nicknaming “Miss Violence” subverts the tutor’s authority; later, the euphemisms (“friend,” “curse”) for menstruation reveal how language shapes understanding of the body.
  • Reading as Escape and Resistance: The library becomes a space where Iris accesses forbidden knowledge through poetry and history, while Laura colours over “disapproved” figures. Miss Goreham’s romantic novels and Adelia’s scrapbooks represent nostalgia for a lost genteel world.
  • The Body as Site of Shame and Mystery: Iris’s menstruation is initially feared as a fatal disease; Laura’s reaction links it to maternal death. Father’s silence about sexuality and his focus on “uniforms” aim to erase evidence of the body.
  • Pulp Magazines and Popular Culture: Reenie’s brother’s smuggled magazines provide a counter-narrative to Reenie’s moral warnings, fuelling the girls’ adventurous fantasies and their ability to identify (and dismiss) imagined threats.

Why This Chapter Matters

This chapter deepens our understanding of the Chase sisters’ isolated childhood and the gendered pressures that shape them. Iris’s transition into puberty marks a fracture in the sibling bond: Laura cannot accept the biological reality that separates them. The chapter also introduces the theme of memory (the “pointless afternoons” Iris longs for) and foreshadows the repressions that will define their adult lives. Miss Goreham, a minor but poignant character, embodies the faded Victorianism that Avilion represents, and her teaching – however passive – seeds the girls’ lifelong engagement with literature.

Study Questions and Answers

  1. Question: How does Iris and Laura’s behaviour toward their tutors reflect their attitude toward authority? Answer: They deliberately drive tutors away by staring at their foreheads, pretending to be deaf or stupid, and refusing to engage. This shows they resent structured learning and prefer their own unsupervised explorations, viewing adult authority as an obstacle to freedom.

  2. Question: Why does Iris nickname Miss Goreham “Miss Violence,” and what does this reveal about Iris’s character? Answer: Iris considers the name “Miss Violence” an unlikely combination for the gentle tutor and finds it funny. The nickname reveals Iris’s irreverent, creative nature; she uses language to subvert and gain a sense of power over adults.

  3. Question: How does the chapter depict the onset of puberty as a turning point for Iris? Answer: Her father’s sudden strictness over posture and dress, and the need to explain menstruation, mark a shift from childhood freedom to bodily shame and adult control. Iris is confused by her father’s anger and by the blood she initially thought was a fatal illness, highlighting the lack of open communication about female development.

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