Cursed Handmaids And Cursive Eves

The amazing industrial band I:Scintilla. Can't wait for new album 'Dying and Falling'!

You can find the lyrics to 'Cursive Eve' here.

As I already discussed in my previous article on ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’, Gilead, the land in which the novel is set, is a dystopian world founded on extremist Puritan Christian principles – a patriarchal misogynistic society. But how does something so twisted and evil emerge out of the words of a Bible that supposedly teaches us the righteousness of equity, to love our neighbours and to live peaceful lives?

Let’s rephrase that: the words of a Bible that supposedly preaches goodwill to all men, the importance of brotherhood and to love our Father.

The song ‘Cursive Eve’ by I:Scintilla is one interpretation of Christianity which highlights how such a sexist, unjust society as Gilead could have been conceived. In the words of Briony, the lead singer, ‘the song is about the oppressive Christian views of women, and the rigid roles and moulds many women feel they are forced into, from birth to adulthood’. She also comments that ‘these outlooks seem to have a profound consequence on a woman’s self-esteem, mental stability, creativity and sexuality’ – all consequences that are shown in a devastating light in ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ through the experiences of Offred and her fellow handmaids.

So, how does religion have such profound consequences on women from birth till adulthood? Well, at birth, as well as the significant pre-determination of various aspects of your life dependent on your gender, who you become is also dependent on your parents, and the society you grow up in. If you grow up in a society founded on religious beliefs, this will impact your identity. In ‘Cursive Eve’, this factor is not presented as simply a passive factor of your surroundings, but as something that confines and suppresses individuality: ‘you were born wrapped in the pages / the words bind your mind and body’. However, this is not something that all children are subjected to. I:Scintilla say that despite the ‘false comfort of thin paper’ every child is wrapped in, they are distinguished and differentiated by gender. And if you’re female, this means that ‘you’re claimed as unclean property’, and ‘classified as a nameless mass’.

The next verse introduces the idea of ‘they’ – ‘they’ representing those whose views are presented in the Bible, and those who enforce ‘the Word’. In ‘Cursive Eve’, ‘they’ are always the active group, whilst ‘you’ (women) are passive (here I:Scintilla’s use of second-person address has an ‘othering’ effect that isolates the addressee, reciprocating the effect of misogynistic Christian beliefs on women). ‘They say you need guilt to be good’ shows how the Bible dictates how women need to suffer guiltiness (regardless of individuality) to be considered ‘good’. Why? ‘They say in you lives an Eve’. Eden lost – Eve’s fault. Eve fell first, dragging Adam down with her.

Timothy 2:13-14 – ‘For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in transgression’.

Thus womankind is forever seconded in the eyes of Christianity, subjected to patriarchal control, and made to feel guilty, whilst ‘your brothers all remain blameless’. This male interpretation of ‘the Word’ turns Biblical belief into the ‘heart of snares and nets’ to incarcerate and restrain women, whilst the hands of believers become restrictive ‘bands’.

The beginning of the third verse reads like a sermon:

‘They say “in you lives an Eve” and
“Thy desire rules over thee”
“Thou shall not let witches live”’

The line ‘thy desire rules over thee’ is, in fact, a subverted version of a passage from Genesis (3:16). The actual line is ‘thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee’ – even more patriarchal and demeaning of women than I:Scintilla’s version! I:Scintilla highlight Eve, witches, and later, ‘male angels’ – all Christian icons; all very paternal and misogynistic in nature. ‘Witches’ were any woman in some way alienated from society and thus labelled ‘evil’. They were feared by people in many Christian societies around the world, and any suspect was subject to a witch trial – inevitably ending in the murder of the woman in question, regardless of actual guilt. After all, a woman needs guilt to be good, so if she doesn’t die a witch, she should be glad to die an innocent, right? Again, I:Scintilla reiterate how constricted women are by such beliefs: ‘the fiction binds your mind and body’. It is significant that this is almost a direct repeat from an earlier phrase, the only difference being that ‘the words’ has now been changed to ‘the fiction’ – showing how really ‘the Word’ is fictitious in nature.

The ideas of the salvation the religion supposedly offers and the actual bondage in its place are directly juxtaposed in the lyrics of the chorus, where Biblical devotion is even likened to BDSM:

‘Kneel - here you’re not scared to die

Beg - those dogs will lick and drink you dry

Kneel - eat the pretty cursive lie

Beg - and you will not be scared to die’

Kneeling and begging are both submissive positions, used when pleading for something. The idea of kneeling here is contrasted to kneeling during prayers, and begging is likened to the behaviour of a dog trying to appease its master. But this time the dogs are superior to women: the lyric ‘those dogs will lick and drink you dry’ not only highlights the low position women have been assigned by the Bible, but how they are (ab)used, subjected to the whim of the patriarchy. The ‘pretty cursive lie’ that women are forced to eat is, obviously, the words of the Bible; the word ‘cursive’ highlighting the handwritten (and therefore man-made and fictitious) nature of the Bible, and the flow of how these words are continually interpreted and reinterpreted and misinterpreted to further repress and demean women. Women are also presented with a threat: only if they accept and ‘eat’ these lies, will they ‘not be scared to die’ – i.e. only by conforming to the restricted lives the Bibles states they can live, can they reach heaven.

And so women are forced into the ‘rigid roles and moulds’ that Biblical teachings have created for them. They are totally overwhelmed by ‘the Word’, turned into possessions of the Church. The lyric ‘give you away to male angels’ shows this possession (women can be given, and can thus be ‘held’), but it is also shown to be a possession that is unwanted. Women are given away to ‘male angels’ (another patriarchal symbol: men are powerful, heavenly beings) for reformation, to combat their evil whilst ‘the leaders’ (the mysterious ‘they’) ‘all remain shameless’, despite the unjust, sexist treatment they are perpetrating. To allow this reformation, women are told they must ‘wash away rain’s ancient marking’ – in other words, erase the Eve-mould which they are cast in from the dawn of time (impossible, as it is not a role they have ascribed to themselves), and ‘beg [themselves] for forgiveness’ – also impossible; how can one forgive themselves for something they have never done? Thus reformation is inconceivable, and women must remain ‘evil’ and unclean forever – but of course, this is their fault – after all, they were given guidance on how to go about their spiritual rejuvenation.

The final section of the song contains further subverted passages from Genesis: ‘must thy sorrow multiply / thy conception in sorrow’ is a play on the words of the same passage in Genesis as referenced earlier: ‘I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception: in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children’. I:Scintilla shows how these words of God before the Fall can be reinterpreted to shift the cause of this sorrow from God (in the Bible, God is the active personage ‘I will...’) to women themselves (‘thy sorrow multiply’, ‘thy conception in sorrow’ – the sorrow belongs solely to women instead of being borne upon them by someone else). This shows how interpretations of the Bible can really subvert the meaning of the text, and how interpretations can be used to condemn and oppress women. They can easily be told ‘thou shall live in the silence / with all subjection’ (a subversion of ‘let the wom[e]n learn in silence with all subjection’ – Timothy 2:11, which is also used by a Commander at the opening of a Pravaganza in ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’), and will remain voiceless victims, controlled and repressed by the will of ‘the Word’. The passage from Timothy continues ‘notwithstanding, she shall be saved by childbearing’ – just one of the ‘rigid roles’ prescribed for women by Christian doctrine, and the principle upon which Gilead is based.

And what of man – the leaders, the male angels? I:Scintilla present him far from the fallen-heroic image of Adam in Genesis, who was tricked by Eve into evilness. Although they admit that ‘he may hear false answers’, and be influenced by ‘evil’ outside himself, I:Scintilla point out that ‘he lets the voices in’ – it is his choice what to believe. Thus they claim that Adam was equally to blame for the Fall, and that men are no more sacred than women.

The last couple of lines of ‘Cursive Eve’ I perceive as a question, posed to women: ‘must thy sorrow follow / visions in his head?’. Must women’s oppression and misery be caused by men’s fictions - men’s religions? It is not a question for women to take upon themselves, but one to make them think: is this what I want to be told to believe; do I want to have such ‘sorrow’ forced upon me? It is an offer of escape.

* * *

Of course, ‘Cursive Eve’ is just one interpretation of the effects of Christianity – and everyone is entitled to their own view. My point is, the Bible, as with any literature, is there to be interpreted, and so it has been – by Christians and non-Christians alike. As with any form of organised religion, different factions of Christianity have emerged, all believing slightly different things under the huge banner of ‘Christianity’. This is nothing to object to – but it allows extremist groups to emerge. Those groups of people who twist and subvert the words of their ‘god’, or ‘prophet’, or whoever, until they bear little resemblance to the words out of which they were borne. This is what happened in Gilead, where the extremists took over the country and used their power to enforce their beliefs on everyone else, persecuting and executing those of opposing religions. They twisted the words of the Bible to enforce their misogynistic beliefs on an entire population (almost everything Aunt Lydia says is a clear example of this), and to perpetrate evil, all in the name of God. All from the Word of God.

From the Word, anything is possible.