Bluebeard’s Egg: the Epilogue
The history of women’s rights in America is characterized in waves. The first wave gave women the right to vote. The second wave fought for opportunity in the workforce and sexual liberation. The third, and most recent, wave is attacking a slurry of prominent issues, each more nuanced than the last. In “Bluebeard’s Egg”, Atwood comments on the women’s liberation movement in the 1980s using her changing representation of the egg from stupidity and ignorance to freedom and redemption. However, Atwood suggests that a single egg is only a mere battle in the overall war; once one egg hatches, another takes its place in the incubation chamber to begin the cycle once more.
An egg, in itself, is simply a vesicle of nutrients and genetic material, and serves as the place where an embryo develops until it can survive the outside environment. It is an object, neither smart nor dumb, that is dependent on another being for as long as it is an egg. On the first read through, while Ed is still the embodiment of the egg in the reader’s mind, Sally identifies Ed with his “monumental and almost energetic stupidity” (“Bluebeard’s Egg” 206). However, the third person narrator, largely invisible to the reader except in select instances, interjects with the fact that “Ed is a real person, with a lot more to him than these simplistic renditions allow for; which sometimes worries her” (“Bluebeard’s Egg” 207). This interjection foreshadows the true nature of the egg’s identity. Sally knows deep inside that this excuse for her love of Ed is simply her way of protecting herself from complexities that sit in plain sight, such as Ed’s “inner world,” thick with trees, but too thick for Sally to continue to delve deeper (218–219). It is as if the egg knows that inside itself exists a small bunch of cells rapidly dividing and growing bigger and bigger and will one day crack open that protective barrier.
The objectification of Ed is not limited to Sally. Marylynn shares Sally’s sentiments in his obtuseness when she says, “he’s just like a button: he’s so bright and shiny. If he were mine, I’d get him bronzed and keep him on the mantlepiece” (“Bluebeard’s Egg” 209). Sally knows that the comment is patronizing, yet does only a little to defend her husband. She tends to take statements at face value, despite the nagging possibility that something unsavory may be happening in places she chooses not to look. Sally is purposefully ignorant. This is evident when Atwood writes, “Ed doesn’t know what happened with these marriages, what went wrong. His protestations of ignorance…is frustrating to Sally, because she would like to hear the whole story. But it’s also cause for anxiety: if he doesn’t know what happened with the other two, maybe the same thing could be happening with her and he doesn’t know about that, either” (“Bluebeard’s Egg” 207). She knows that there is reason for her to take action, but she refuses to do so. It is as if she is being handed Schrodinger’s box, but refuses to open it, and just assumes the cat is in good health. Whether or not Ed knows the true nature of his previous relationships, Sally’s simultaneous abundance and lack of curiosity points to the one of the reasons the women’s movement started. The oppression of almost any group of people in America has almost always been coupled with a lack of education. Minorities, women, and the poor are have been disproportionately affected by unequal opportunities to good education (Fryer). With the gift of knowledge comes the gift of authority over one’s own actions. Sally is stuck in a stasis between wanting to know and taking the necessary steps towards actually knowing. This can be dangerous. The ignorant are easy to manipulate, and Ed, in withholding information from Sally, has the upper hand. In this case, knowledge is quite literally power.
In an interview with the BBC, Atwood makes this comparison with the X-ray powers that Superman has. He has the ability to control when he can see through walls, and has the freedom to turn it off. Therefore, “because it is presented in a limited way, this is seen as a virtue…because it helps [Superman] solve crimes” (“Bluebeard’s Egg by Margaret Atwood”). She presents this in contrast with other science fiction stories that depict characters suffering from their super powers. For example, in the FX television show Legion, based off of the Marvel comic book series of the same name, Legion’s power of telepathy is, rather than a “virtue,” the source of his constant torment. So, instead of saving the world, Legion’s ability to hear the thoughts of others lands him a mental hospital with a diagnosis of schizophrenia. Atwood’s comparison between limited and controlled use versus unmanageable impulses suggests that Sally’s need to understand everything is perhaps misplaced. In deciding she needs to know everything, yet not choosing to turn on her X-ray vision, she is taking away any possible advantage, and retreating back behind her shell.
Because of this, Ed is given the upper hand, and has the power of manipulation over Sally. Throughout the story Sally demonstrates a sense of learned helplessness. She ignores the chatter from the women who follow Ed around and shows a lack of control in dealing with the situation. The term “learned helplessness” comes from an ethically questionable experiment performed by Martin Seligman in 1968. In it, he had dogs endure a certain punishment, usually electric shocks, with no way to stop it. In a second round of testing with the same dogs, they were given methods to stop the shocks, such as flipping a lever or jumping a fence. However, the dogs had learned from the previous experience that they had no control, so they simply sat there and took the shock, despite the fact that there was a clear path they could take to stop the pain (Seligman). Sally acts like the dogs. She has gotten used to her husband’s claims of ignorance, and she does nothing to stop the “paparazzi” that ambush her husband, despite her concerns. These “shocks” have become the norm, and, after all, what can she do to change the norm? Ed has conditioned her into dismissing the possible issues that may have risen in their marriage; what is the point in asking about their relationship if she gets the same answer every time?
Sally’s lack of curiosity and action is telling of Atwood’s views on how the women’s liberation movement happened. She shared the sentiment that Gloria Steinem shared in an interview with The Washington Post, “I once thought I would do this for two or three years and then go home to my real life. But that was a symptom of the movement’s tone at the time, which was, ‘Surely, if we just explain to everybody how unjust this is, they will want to fix it’” (qtd. in Bumiller). Sally embodies the majority of people who sat around with apathy while women were up in arms and protesting. The way Sally reacts to seeing her husband’s infidelity shows that in order to spark change, someone needs to take the apathetic by the hand and guide them to the problem. Someone else needs to unlock the door and drop them directly in the chamber. And even then, all they would care about is washing away the blood, ignoring the crack in their shell caused by the fall.
Once through the chamber and back out, Sally, still in denial of the sight she saw, cannot help but see the world through the red stain. Atwood writes, “That’s how he refers to Mrs. Rudge, although she’s been with them for three years now: the woman. And Mrs. Bird before her, as though they are interchangeable. This has never bothered Sally before” (“Bluebeard’s Egg” 227). Mrs. Rudge and Mrs. Bird, although only mentioned in passing, serve as foils for Sally — a representation of what Sally is and what she could become. Like the former maids, Ed’s previous wives, in his mind, are not separate from Sally; to him, they are one and the same. Bluebeard never throws the egg away after it has been stained; instead, he cleans it and polishes it until it looks as good as new. Once Ed finds a new wife, the cycle begins once again: loving, manipulating, and then one day, he comes back to a stained egg rids himself of the wife, then cleans the egg once more. Atwood suggests that the role of the egg, rather than a physical egg, is being passed from spouse to spouse, just as the actual egg in “The Fitcher’s Bird” was passed from spouse to spouse. Since Sally is the egg, once she becomes “stained,” or, in Sally’s case, aware of the truth, Ed moves on. The focus of objectification has now switched. The relationship between the egg and Bluebeard has changed, and Sally is aware of that. She still clings to the comfort of learned helplessness as she “puts her arms around him, [and] holds on tighter than she should” (“Bluebeard’s Egg” 227); however, that comfort is fading. Instead, the helplessness she feels truly feels like helplessness; “she has no control over it” (“Bluebeard’s Egg” 227).
However, the open-ended finish gives the reader some liberties in imagining what might have happened. The imagery of the egg shifts when “it darkens: rose-red, crimson” (“Bluebeard’s Egg” 227). She has internalized the stain from before, and, instead of letting it hurt her, she asks “What will come out of it?” (“Bluebeard’s Egg” 227). This assumes there was something in the egg all along; the egg was brewing an ultimate plan that, once it bursts from its protective shell, will succeed and survive in the greater world. The egg implies life beyond the incubation and beyond the constant drone of daily life in a loveless marriage. Her childlike trust of those who seemed to care for her melts away in the “something” that is “red and hot inside” her (“Bluebeard’s Egg” 227). Atwood implies optimism in that learned helplessness can be overcome. Sally recognizes that she has control in the way she lives her life and that she is in command of what comes next. The dogs in Seligman’s experiment did not initially respond to any kind of encouragement. The experimenters resorted to physically lifting and moving the dogs away from the electric shocks more than once to convince them that they had the power to affect their circumstances. In the same way, Sally had to be lead by an invisible hand that unlocked the chamber for her before she could see and take control of her fate.
Atwood’s commentary, using “Bluebeard’s Egg,” on the women’s liberation movement and the women’s movement in general highlight the power dynamic of the relationship between men and women, along with the journey of recognizing the disparity to realizing the potential for action. Atwood validates the women’s movement in her portrayal of Sally and the egg. The women’s movement has often been trivialized by men who see women as dramatic and emotional. In that same light, Sally might be seen as paranoid or insecure, but, in an interview with The Paris Review, Atwood counters that interpretation with, “It’s not paranoia. It’s recognition of [Sally’s] situation” (“Margaret Atwood, The Art of Fiction №121”). Atwood does not seek to solve the world’s problems in her writing; rather, she brings these issues into the light. In order to fight for women’s issues, there needs to be an acknowledgement that there are issues. In writing this story, Atwood serves as the guiding hand, leading the reader to the chamber to provoke action. In the ambiguity of her ending, Atwood reminds her readers that what matters is not the hardship that has been endured, but rather the movement that commences afterwards.
Works Cited
Atwood, Margaret. “Bluebeard’s Egg.” Classic Fairy Tales, edited by Maria Tatar, W. W. Norton & Company Inc., 2017, pp. 205–227.
— -. “Margaret Atwood, The Art of Fiction №121.” Interview by Mary Morris. Paris Review Winter 1990: n. pag. Print.
“Bluebeard’s Egg by Margaret Atwood.” Meridian from BBC, 10 June 1987, http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03m0qrg
Bumiller, Elisabeth. “In 1983, the Women’s Movement Was Changing. But Gloria Steinem Stood Her Ground.” The Washington Post 12 Oct. 1983: n. pag. Print.
Fryer, Roland G., Jr. Racial Inequality in the 21st Century: The Declining Significance of Discrimination. The Education Innovation Laboratory. The President and Fellows of Harvard College, 18 June 2010. Web.
Seligman, Martin E. P. “Alleviation of Learned Helplessness in the Dog.” The Journal of Abnormal Psychology 73 (1968): 256–62. Print.
