The Heart Goes Last

It is explained that they chose the 1950s aesthetic for Consilience because “that was the decade in which most people self-identified as being happy” (92). Is there a deeper significance to this choice? How might it intersect with other ideas or themes Margaret Atwood explores throughout the text?

At one point in the novel, when Stan believes he may soon die, he looks back on his life and regrets the “so many small choices” that led him to that point (337). However, how much agency does Stan really have throughout the story? Is he to blame for the things that happen to him? Could things have gone differently? Why or why not?

After he escapes Consilience, Stan spends a few days living at the Elvisorium with the employees of UR-ELF and finds it a very different experience to the town he left. Compare and contrast the two settings, considering the rules, leaders, people, goals, and politics of each. In what ways do they mirror one another? In what ways do they contrast? What is the significance of their juxtaposition?

Stan and Charmaine’s relationship is something of a rollercoaster throughout the novel. At some moments they appear happy together, yet at others, they consider murdering one another. How does the novel depict their marriage and sexual relationships more broadly?

A key component of Atwood’s dystopia in The Heart Goes Last is Positron Prison itself. Why do you think she built her fictional town around a prison? What are its allegoric and thematic implications?

Many of the characters debate the ethical implications of possibilibots, especially the kiddybot line and the ones made to look like a specific person. What is the significance of these bots? How do they reflect or interrogate the novel’s wider preoccupations with gender dynamics, sexual desire, and/or free will and consent?

The idea of wealth inequality is central to almost everything that happens in the novel. How are wealth and poverty depicted? How are wealth and power connected in the novel, and why?

The novel ends by undermining its (satirical) fairytale ending and revealing to Charmaine that she does not have to be with Stan—the choice is hers. What is the significance of leaving the story open-ended instead of providing the reader with closure? What is the significance of Charmaine’s response?