Completing the Circle: A Dull Villian

According to The New York Times review, at the end of the novel, “Mae, then, is not a victim but  a dull villain.” And I quite agree. Throughout the novel, Mae has been subject to the Circle’s psychiatric conditioning and subsequently it has negatively affected her life outside of the Circle which makes her in a sense a victim. Towards the end of the novel, Mae’s parents ignore her and Mercer tries to cut Mae and the Circle out of his life completely. Later Mae, thinking as always that she is right and being involved in the Circle is the best thing for everyone, brings about Mercer death. This situation made apparent that Mae has become a dull villain. It is a villainous act to essensially drive someone to suicide, which could be considered murder.

But what is even more striking is not Mae’s change from being the victim to the villain but from being a bright, free thinking individual to a  dull Circle prototype. While Mae strived to embody all the ideal image of a Circler, Mae lost sight of her humanity that kept her grounded to her intuition and the people around her.

When you fast forward further to the end of the novel, Kalden/Ty informs Mae of the potential destruction the Circle will cause, much like the shark from the Mariana’s Trench foreshadowed. However Mae, already brainwashed, decides not to consider and thus not follow through with Kalden/Ty’s plan to dismantle the Circle to protect everybody’s right to anonymity on the internet. Mae thinks as any true Circler would and goes to Bailey and Strenton with the information. By acting as a loyal Circler, Mae has inevitably lost her sense of individualism and thus has become dull. The villainous aspect of Mae is apparent  first with Mercer’s death then with playing her part in eliminating people’s right to remain anonymous on the internet and creating the foundation for a totalitarian government that stems from the Circle.

In novelistic conventions, the main character of the novel is usually the one to, at the conclusion of the book, wrong all the rights and in a sense be the hero facing down the evil villain one last time. Just look at the Hunger Games or the Harry Potter Series for an example of novelistic conventions. Yet The Circle concluded with Mae giving into the perceived evil, The Circle, and the “villains,” Strenton and Bailey. To take it one step further, as The New York Times review stated, Mae had in fact become a villain. To simplify the novelistic conventions, the victim in the novel usually triumphs or hinders the villains. Mae was originally the free-thinking victim but became so entranced by the Circle that she became a mindless villain. Egger’s departure from these traditional, novelistic conventions, shock the reader because it is a rather anticlimactic ending which they were not necessarily expecting. This departure is Egger’s warning to the audience that sitting idly by as technology develops without checks, could result in a development as seen in the Circle.

1 Thought.

  1. Hey!
    Great post–I answered the same question:)
    I completely agree with your analysis of Mae’s transformation from victim to villain and how she almost does not recognize that she has become a villain, rather she sees herself purely as a loyal agent of The Circle. It was really interesting how you touched upon the change in Mae’s thought process as she transitioned into becoming a fully absorbed member of The Circle and how deeply her mind was manipulated. This change in her thinking is truly fascinating and also scary for it shows how a single system can collectively change not only the thought of one person, but a collective group and also sustain that collective thought and change the dynamic of society. I also thought it was really creative how you tied in the traditional concept of novels and their main characters and how those characters are usually seen as the heroes of the story and are there to right the wrongs, whereas Mae does not.
    Awesome job!

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