nolite te bastardes carborundorum

In my visual representationI chose to depict the scene where Offred notices the phrase “Nolite te bastardes Carborundorum” scrawled into her closet,this roughly translates to “don’t let the bastards beat you down”. This scene really stood out to me as it shows possibly two things, a previous handmaid had scratched this into her closet shortly before escaping gilead and moving on to brighter pastures. Or a previous handmaid had scratched the message into the closet shortly before being captured, punished, or even killed for displaying rebellious behavior. I think the fact that this scene was so open to interpretation is what made me so interested in it. However I chose the ladder in my depiction, having very muted colors and a general disheveled and gloomy look to the closet certainly does not paint a picture of hope. I chose to have the cloak hanging slightly off of the hanger in order to show that Offred still has some human instincts of laziness and that the brainwashing has not yet fully taken her over. My choice of only putting one robe and wing set in the closet is meant to show how little the handmaid’s actually possess; they are allowed no personal belongings, and the ones mandated to them are very few. The dresser itself I tried to make slightly more ornate, in order to make it fit with the rest of the house, but made sure to make it not overly complicated in order to re-emphasize the point that there are no luxuries when you are a handmaid.I think the main reason that I wanted to add a visual component to this scene is because Offred goes into very little detail regarding the closet and the message inside it, and I believe that it deserved more attention. This must be a choice by the author to show offred’s attitude towards rebellion at the time. I think that gilead is full of amazingly grim imagery that is very well conveyed just for being words on a page. When reading it is as if I can see the world of gilead around me. I made this piece feel natural, as if I had this picture In my mind the whole time.