Traveller_Levin's Blog

Rape Fantasies

Margaret Atwood

Margaret Atwood (1939-)生於加拿大首都渥太華，幼時，隨父親到加拿大各地進行森林昆蟲學研究，八年級才正式就學，已廣泛閱讀神話、童話、寓言及漫畫。六歲開始寫作，十六歲立定志向成為專業作家。獲多倫多大學文學學士、麻省拉德克利夫學院的文學碩士及哈佛大學博士學位。先後任教於數所知名大學，期間亦做過收銀員、餐廳服務生、市場研究員及電影編劇等工作。迄今已出版21本詩集、14本長篇小說、9本短篇小說集以及童書與文學評論。她獲獎無數，包括加拿大總督文學獎、英聯邦文學獎、義大利普雷米歐·蒙德羅獎、哈佛大學百年獎章、《悉尼時報》文學傑出獎、法國政府文學藝術勳章、曼．布克獎。被尊崇為當代最傑出作家之一，素有“加拿大文學女王”之稱。

Margaret Atwood寫作風格驚人地多樣，其小說敘述模式看似傳統小說，但在文本結構、敘事安排、文類並置的表現手法，卻製造出後現代的虛實、矛盾、質疑的感覺。作品結尾常模稜兩可，留給讀者許多自己想像空間。靈活運用象徵的技巧在傳統寫實主義與未來科幻小說間游走，讓讀者在意識到其諷刺、批評的嚴肅議題同時，亦沉浸在其有趣且豐富的文字創作中。

The way they’re going on about it in the magazines you’d think it was just invented, and not only that but it’s something terrific, like a vaccine for cancer. They put it in capital letters on the front cover, and inside they have these questionnaires like the ones they used to have about whether you were a good enough wife or endomorph or an ectomorph1, remember that? with the scoring upside down, and then these numbered do-it-yourself dealies2, you know? RAPE, TEN THINGS TO DO ABOUT IT, like it was ten new hairdos or something. I mean, what’s so new about it?

So at work they all have to talk about it because no matter what magazine you open, there it is, staring you right between the eyes, and they’re beginning to have it on the television, too. Personally I’d prefer a June Allyson movie3 anytime but they don’t make them any more and they don’t even have them that much on the Late Show4. For instance, day before yesterday, that would be Wednesday, thank god it's Friday as they say, we were sitting around in the women’s lunch room—the lunch room, I mean you’d think you could get some peace and quiet in there—and Chrissy closes up the magazine she’s been reading and says, “How about it, girls, do you have rape fantasies?”

The four of us were having our game of bridge the way we always do, and I had a bare twelve points counting the singleton with not that much of a bid in anything5. So I said one club, hoping Sondra would remember about the one club convention6, because the time before when I used that she thought I really meant clubs and she bid us up to three, and all I had was four little ones with nothing higher than a six, and We went down two and on top of that we were vulnerable7. She is not the world’s best bridge player. I mean, neither am I but there’s a limit.

1.   1940年代，美國心理學家William Herbert Sheldon用胚胎學的三個概念來評價體型，並提出相應的氣質類型：

(1) 内胚層體型（endomorphy），特徵是肥胖、滾圓。氣質類型是内臟優勢型（viscerotonia），特徵是放鬆，追求享樂。

(2) 中胚層體型（mesomorphy），特徵是肌肉發達，呈三角形。氣質類型是身體優勢型（somatotation），特徵是精力充沛，喜歡冒險。

(3) 外胚層體型（ectomorphy），特徵是瘦長。氣質類型是頭腦優勢型（cerebrotonia），特徵是自我克制、孤獨。

2.   these numbered do-it-yourself dealies指問卷調查中之自我評量計分。

3.   June Allyson為美國40、50年代知名的愛情文藝片女明星。

4.   the Late Show：美國70、80年代CBS電視播放的午深夜電影節目。

5.   singleton (橋牌等遊戲中，一手牌中某花色持有)單張。

bid 叫牌(不包括pass, double, redouble)。

6.   指敘事者與其牌友Sondra以一張梅花為暗號對局策略。

7.   橋牌計分中有「身價」(vulnerability) 的概念，前局贏家稱之「有身價」vulnerable，輸家則是「無身價」not vulnerable。

Darlene passed but the damage was done8, Sondra’s head went round like it was on ball bearings9 and she said, “What fantasies?”

“Rape fantasies,” Chrissy said. She’s a receptionist and she looks like one; she’s pretty but cool as a cucumber10, like she's been painted all over with nail polish, if you know what I mean. Varnished. “It says here all women have rape fantasies.”

“For Chrissake, I’m eating an egg sandwich,” I said, “and I bid one club and Darlene passed.”

“You mean, like some guy jumping you in an alley or something,” Sondra said. She was eating her lunch, we all eat our lunches during the game, and she bit into a piece of that celery she always brings and started to chew away on it with this thoughtful expression in her eyes and I knew we might as well pack it in11 as far as the game was concerned.

“Yeah, sort of like that,” Chrissy said. She was blushing a little, you could see it even under her makeup.

8.   the damage was done傷害已經造成，指Chrissy的問題已經影響到她的牌友Sondra的打牌思緒。

9.   ball bearings 滾動軸承。

10. cool as a cucumber這個片語形容一個人非常冷靜，鎮定自若。

11. might as well：倒不如；不妨。pack it in：停止某項工作或活動，這裡是說被Chrissy這一攪和，我們還不如不要玩牌了（玩橋牌不能專心，倒不如不要玩。）。

“I don’t think you should go out alone at night,” Darlene said, “you put yourself in a position12,” and I may have been mistaken but she was looking at me. She’s the oldest, she’s forty-one though you wouldn’t know it and neither does she, but I looked it up in the employees’ file. I like to guess a person’s age and then look it up to see if I’m right. I let myself have an extra pack of cigarettes if I am, though I’m trying to cut down13. I figure it’s harmless as long as you don’t tell. I mean, not everyone has access to that file, it’s more or less confidential. But it’s all right if I tell you, I don’t expect you’ll ever meet her, though you never know, it’s a small world. Anyway.

“For heaven’s sake, it’s only Toronto," Greta said. She worked in Detroit for three years and she never lets you forget it, it’s like she thinks she’s a war hero or something, we should all admire her just for the fact that she’s still walking this earth, though she was really living in Windsor the whole time, she just worked in Detroit. Which for me doesn’t really count14. It's where you sleep, right?

“Well, do you?” Chrissy said. She was obviously trying to tell us about hers but she wasn’t about to go first, she’s cautious, that one.15

 “I certainly don’t,” Darlene said, and she wrinkled up her nose, like this, and I had to laugh. “I think it’s disgusting. ” She’s divorced, I read that in the file too, she never talks about it. It must’ve been years ago anyway. She got up and went over to the coffee machine and tumed her back on us as though she wasn't going to have anything more to do with it.

“Well,” Greta said. I could see it was going to be between her and Chrissy. They're both blondes, I don’t mean that in a bitchy way but they do try to outdress16 each other. Greta would like to get out of Filing17, she’d like to be a receptionist too so she could meet more people. You don’t meet much of anyone in Filing except other people in Filing. Me, I don’t mind it so much, I have outside interests.18

12. position：處境。

13. 敘述者喜歡猜人家的年紀，然後去偷翻員工檔案資料，若她猜對就會獎賞自己一包菸，雖然她試著要少抽一點菸。

14. Greta在底特律工作過三年，底特律以治安差聞名，所以她認為比起來多倫多的治安要好太多了。敘述者凸她槽，說她住在Windsor，在底特律只是工作，根本不算數。

15. that one那種人，指Chrissy。

16.outdress：to dress better than…..比誰的穿著服飾要更漂亮、華麗。

17. Filing檔案部門。

18. 意指她興致是在公司圈外尋找男朋友。

“Well,” Greta said, “I sometimes think about, you know my apartment? It’s got this little balcony, I like to sit out there in the summer and I have a few plants out there. I never bother that much about locking the door to the balcony, it’s one of those sliding glass ones, I'm on the eighteenth floor for heaven’s sake, I’ve got a good view of the lake and the CN Tower and all. But I'm sitting around one night in my housecoat, watching TV with my shoes off, you know how you do, and I see this guy’s feet, coming down past the window, and the next thing you know he’s standing on the balcony, he’s let himself down by a rope with a hook on the end of it from the floor above, that’s the nineteenth, and before I can even get up off the chesterfield he's inside the apartment. He’s all dressed in black with black gloves on"—I knew right away what show she got the black gloves off19 because I saw the same one—“and then he, well, you know. ”

“You know what?” Chrissy said, but Greta said, “And afterwards he tells me that he goes all over the outside of the apartment building like that, from one floor to another, with his rope and his hook . . . and then he goes out to the balcony and tosses his rope, and he climbs up it and disappears."

“just like Tarzan,” I said, but nobody laughed.

“Is that all?” Chrissy said. “Don’t you ever think about, well, I think about being in the bathtub, with no clothes on . .

“So who takes a bath in their clothes?” I said, you have to admit it’s stupid when you come to think of it, but she just went on, “with lots of bubbles, what I use is Vitabath, it's more expensive but it’s so relaxing, and my hair pinned up, and the door opens and this fellow’s standing there. . .

“How’d he get in?” Greta said.

“Oh, I don’t know, through a window or something. Well, I can’t very well get out of the bathtub, the bathroom's too small and besides he’s blocking the doorway, so I just lie there, and he starts to very slowly take his own clothes off, and then he gets into the bathtub with me.

“Don’t you scream or anything?” said Darlene. She’d come back with her cup of coffee, she was getting really interested. “I’d scream like bloody murder.”

“Who’d hear me?” Chrissy said. “Besides, all the articles say it’s better not to resist, that way you don’t get hurt.”

"Anyway you might get bubbles up your nose,” I said, “from the deep breathing, " and I swear all four of them looked at me like I was in bad taste20, like I’d insulted the Virgin Mary or something. I mean, I don’t see what’s wrong with a little joke now and then. Life’s too short, right?

19. Greta說她幻想有個男人自十九樓繫繩闖入她家陽臺，那人著黑衣，戴黑手套。敘述者拆她台，說她立刻就知道Greta這個戴黑手套的畫面是從哪一個電視節目抄襲來的。

Off=from，接前面的what show。

20. 敘述者消遣Chrissy說她若尖叫，會將洗澡的泡泡弄得滿臉都是。在座四人都瞪著敘述者，覺得她很沒品，就好像她侮辱了聖母瑪利亞或什麼的。

“Listen,” I said, “those aren’t rape fantasies. I mean, you aren’t getting raped, it’s just some guy you haven’t met formally who happens to be more attractive than Derek Cummins”—-he’s the Assistant Manager, he wears elevator shoes or at any rate they have these thick soles and he has this funny way of talking, we call him Derek Duck——“and you have a good time. Rape is when they’ve got a knife or something and you don’t want to.”

“So what about you, Estelle,” Chrissy said, she was miffed21 because I laughed at her fantasy, she thought I was putting her down22. Sondra was miffed too, by this time she’d finished her celery and she wanted to tell about hers, but she hadn’t got in fast enough.

“All right, let me tell you one,” I said. “I’m walking down this dark street at night and this fellow comes up and grabs my arm. Now it so happens that I have a plastic lemon23 in my purse, you know how it always says you should carry a plastic lemon in your purse? I don’t really do it, I tried it once but the darn thing leaked all over my chequebook, but in this fantasy I have one, and I say to him, “You’re intending to rape me, right?” and he nods, so I open my purse to get the plastic lemon, and I can’t find it! My purse is full of all this junk, Kleenex and cigarettes and my change purse and my lipstick and my driver’s licence, you know the kind of stuff; so I ask him to hold out his hands, like this, and I pile all this junk into them and down at the bottom there’s the plastic lemon, and I can’t get the top off. So I hand it to him and he’s very obliging24, he twists the top off and hands it back to me, and I squirt him in the eye."

I hope you don’t think that’s too vicious. Come to think of it, it is a bit mean, especially when he was so polite and all.

“That’s your rape fantasy?” Chrissy says. “I d0n’t believe it.”

“She’s a card25,” Darlene says, she and I are the ones that’ve been here the longest and she never will forget the time I got drunk at the office party and insisted I was going to dance under the table instead of on top of it, I did a sort of Cossack number26 but then I hit my head the bottom of the table—actually it was a desk—-when I went to get up, and I knocked myself out cold.27 She’s decided that’s the mark of an original mind and she tells everyone now about it and I’m not sure that’s fair. Though I did do it.

21. miff：使得被冒犯，被惹惱。這類動詞常以被動式表示：我覺得惱怒 I am miffed. 我覺得尷尬 I am embarrassed.

22. put down：批評、奚落、詆毀、羞辱。

23. plastic lemon婦女防色狼的自衛武器，裡頭裝有檸檬汁。

24. obliging：ready to do favors for others; accommodating樂意幫人家忙。

25.card：a witty, entertaining, or eccentric person一個機智又好笑的怪咖。

26. Cossack number：Russian folk dance called the kazatzka.哥薩克舞。

27. 這裡cold當副詞使用：thoroughly; absolutely完全，徹底。

“I’m being totally honest,” I say. I always am and they know it. There’s no point in being anything, is the way I look at it, and sooner or later the truth will out so you might as well not waste time28, right? “You should hear the one about the Easy-Off Oven Cleaner.29”

But that was the end of the lunch hour, with one bridge game shot to hell, and the next day we spent most of the time arguing over whether to start a new game or play out the hands we had left over from the day before, so Sondra never did get a chance to tell about her rape fantasy.

It started me thinking though, about my own rape fantasies, Maybe I’m abnormal or something, I mean I have fantasies about handsome strangers coming in through the window too, like Mr. Clean30, I wish one would, please god somebody without flat feet and big sweat marks on his shirt, and over five feet five, believe me being tall is a handicap though it’s getting better, tall guys are starting to like someone whose nose reaches higher than their belly button. But if you’re being totally honest you can’t count those as rape fantasies. In a real rape fantasy, what you should feel is this anxiety, like when you think about your apartment building catching on fire and whether you should use the elevator or the stairs or maybe just stick your head under a wet towel, and you try to remember everything you’ve read about what to do but you can’t decide.

For instance, I’m walking along this dark street at night and this short, ugly fellow comes up and grabs my arm, and not only is he ugly, you know, with a sort of puffy nothing face31, like those fellows you have to talk to in the bank when your account’s overdrawn—of course I don’t mean they’re all like that——but he’s absolutely covered in pimples. So he gets me pinned against the wall, he’s short but he’s heavy, and he starts to undo himself32 and the zipper gets stuck. I mean, the most significant moments in a girl’s life, it’s almost like getting married or having a baby or something, and he sticks the zipper.

So I say, kind of disgusted, “Oh for Chrissake,” and he starts to cry. He tells me he’s never been able to get anything right in his entire life, and this is the last straw33, he’s going to go jump off a bridge.

28. 敘述者說她一向誠實，犯不著瞎編，反正事實遲早都會暴露出來的，倒不如直截了當，不用浪費時間。

29. Easy-Off Oven Cleaner一種廚房清潔劑的品牌，這裡是說妳們應該聽聽這個清潔劑的廣告。

30. Mr. Clean前述Easy-Off Oven Cleaner廣告中的角色。

31. puffy：腫脹的。這裡nothing當形容詞使用：Insignificant or worthless相貌不揚、貌寝。

32.undo himself 脫他自己的衣服。

33. the last straw 指承受苦難、折磨的最後極限。

“Look,” I say, I feel so sorry for him, in my rape fantasies I always end up feeling sorry for the guy, I mean there has to be something wrong with them, if it was Clint Eastwood it’d be different but worse luck it never is. I was the kind of little girl who buried dead robins, know what I mean? It used to drive my mother nuts34, she didn’t like me touching them, because of the germs I guess. So I say, “Listen, I know how you feel. You really should do something about those pimples, if you got rid of them you’d be quite good looking, honest; then you wouldn’t have to go around doing stuff like this. I had them myself once,” I say, to comfort him, but in fact I did, and it ends up I give him the name of my old dermatologist35, the one I had in high school, that was back in Leamington, except I used to go to St. Catharine’s for the dermatologist. I’m telling you, I was really lonely when I first came here; I thought it was going to be such a big adventure and all, but it’s a lot harder to meet people in a city. But I guess it’s different for a guy.

Or I’m lying in bed with this terrible cold, my face is all swollen up, my eyes are red and my nose is dripping like a leaky tap36, and this fellow comes in through the window and he has a terrible cold too, it's a new kind of flu that’s been going around. So he says, “I’b goig do rabe you”37—I hope you don’t mind me holding my nose like this but that's the way I imagine it—and he lets out this terrific sneeze, which slows him down a bit, also I’m no object of beauty myself, you'd have to be some kind of pervert to want to rape someone with a cold like mine, it’d be like raping a bottle of LePage’s mucilage38 the way my nose is running. He’s looking wildly around the room, and I realize it’s because he doesn’t have a piece of Kleenex! “Id’s ride here39,” I say, and I pass him the Kleenex, god knows why he even bothered to get out of bed, you’d think if you were going to go around climbing in windows you’d wait till you were healthier, right? I mean, that takes a certain amount of energy. So I ask him why doesn’t he let me fix him a NeoCitran and scotch40, that's what I always take, you still have the cold but you don’t feel it, so I do and we end up watching the Late Show together. I mean, they aren’t all sex maniacs, the rest of the time they must lead a normal life. I figure they enjoy watching the Late Show just like anybody else. '

I do have a scarier one though . . . where the fellow says he’s hearing angel voices that’re telling him he’s got to kill me, you know, you read about things like that all the time in the papers. In this one I’m not in the apartment where I live now, I’m back in my mother’s house in Leamington and the fellow’s been hiding in the cellar, he grabs my arm when I go downstairs to get a jar of jam and he’s got hold of the axe too, out of the garage, that one is really scary. I mean, what do you say to a nut like that?

34. drive someone nuts讓某人非常地惱怒；搞得某人快抓狂。

35. dermatologist皮膚科醫生。

36. 重感冒，鼻水流個不停，像漏水的水龍頭。

37. “I’b goig do rabe you” 模傚那人口齒不清的發音，正確應該是I’m going to rape you。

38.LePage’s mucilage：LePage品牌的膠水。

39. “Id’s ride here,” 這句也是口齒不清的說法，正確應該是It’s right here。

40.NeoCitran一種感冒藥的品牌，這裡是說：何不讓我為你調杯NeoCitran感冒藥和威士忌。

So I start to shake but after a minute I get control of myself and I say, is he sure the angel voices have got the right person, because I hear the same angel voices and they’ve been telling me for some time that I’m going to give birth to the reincarnation of St. Anne41 who in turn has the Virgin Mary and right after that comes ]esus Christ and the end of the world, and he wouldn’t want to interfere with that, would he? So he gets confused and listens some more, and then he asks for a sign and I show him my vaccination mark, you can see it’s sort of an odd—shaped one, it got infected because I scratched the top off, and that does it, he apologizes and climbs out the coal chute again, which is how he got in in the first place, and I say to myself there’s Some advantage in having been brought up a Catholic42 even though I haven’t been to church since they changed the service into English43, it just isn’t the same, you might as well be a Protestant. I must write to Mother and tell her to nail up that coal chute, it always has bothered me. Funny, I couldn't tell you at all what this man looks like but I know exactly what kind of shoes he’s wearing, because that’s the last I see of him, his shoes going up the coal chute, and they’re the old-fashioned kind that lace up the ankles, even though he’s a young fellow. That’s strange, isn’t it?

Let me tell you though I really sweat until I see him safely out of there and I go upstairs right away and make myself a cup of tea. I don’t think about that one much. My mother always said you shouldn’t dwell on unpleasant things and I generally agree with that, I mean, dwelling on them doesn’t make them go away. Though not dwelling on them doesn’t make them go away either, when you come to think of it.

Sometimes I have these short ones where44 the fellow grabs my arm but I’m really a Kung-Fu expert, can you believe it, in real life I’m sure it would just be a conk on the head45 and that’s that46, like getting your tonsils out, you’d wake up and it would be all over except for the sore places, and you’d be lucky if your neck wasn’t broken or something, I could never even hit the volleyball in gym and a volleyball is fairly, large, you know?—and I just go zap47 with my fingers into his eyes and that’s it, he falls over, or I flip him against a wall or something. But I could never really stick my fingers in anyone’s eyes, could you? It would feel like hot jello48 and I don’t even like cold jello,‘ just thinking about it gives me the creeps49. I feel a bit guilty about that one, I mean how would you like walking around knowing someone’s been blinded for life because of you?

41. St. Anne是基督耶穌的外婆，她生下瑪麗亞，瑪麗亞生下耶穌。

42. been brought up a Catholic以著天主教徒的方式養育長大。a Catholic當副詞使用，更正確的用法應當是as a Catholic，只是在口語中將as省略掉。

43. 原先天主教堂的儀式是使用其他語言（法語或德語），後來改用英語。敘述者說天主教儀式改用英語後感覺跟新教沒什麼兩樣，也就沒再上教堂。

44. where在此並非表示地點，而是表示一種狀況或情勢。最著名的例句“有志者事竟成”Where there is a will, there is a way.

45. a conk on the head：往頭部重擊猛捶。

46. that’s that口語中用來強調情勢或決定已無法改變。

47. zap：猛烈遽然地攻擊。

48. jello 果凍（由商標 Jell-O引申使用）。

49. gives someone the creeps 讓某人覺得毛骨悚然。

But maybe it’s different for a guy.

The most touching one I have is when the fellow grabs my arm and I say, sad and kind of dignified, “You’d be raping a corpse.” That pulls him up short50 and I explain that I’ve just found out I have leukaemia and the doctors have only given me a few months to live. That’s why I’m out pacing the streets alone at night, I need to think, you know, come to terms with51 myself. I don’t really have leukaemia but in the fantasy I do, I guess I chose that particular disease because a girl in my grade four class died of it, the whole class sent her flowers when she was in the hospital. I didn’t understand then that she was going to die and I wanted to have leukaemia too so I could get flowers. Kids are funny, aren’t they? Well, it turns out that he has leukaemia himself and he only has a few months to live, that’s why he’s going around raping people, he’s very bitter because he’s so young and his life is being taken from him before he’s really lived it. So we walk along gently under the street lights, it’s spring and sort of misty, and we end up going for coffee, we’re happy we’ve found the only other person in the world who can understand what we’re going through it’s almost like fate, and after a while we just sort of look at each other and our hands touch, and he comes back with me and moves into my apartment and we spend our last months together before we die, we just sort of don’t wake up in the morning, though I’ve never decided which one of us gets to die first. If it’s him I have to go on and fantasize about the funeral, if it’s me I don’t have to worry about that, so it just about depends on how tired I am at the time. You may not believe this but sometimes I even start crying. I cry at the ends of movies even the ones that aren’t all that sad, so I guess it's the same thing. My mother’s like that too.

The funny thing about these fantasies is that the man is always someone I don’t know, and the statistics in the magazines, well, most of them anyway, they say it’s often someone you do know, at least a little bit, like your boss or something—I mean it wouldn’t be my boss he’s over sixty and I’m sure he couldn’t rape his way out of a paper bag, poor old thing, but it might be someone like Derek Duck, in his elevator shoes, perish the thought52—or someone you just met, who invites you up for a drink, it s getting so you can hardly be sociable any more, and how are you supposed to meet people if you can’t trust them even that basic amount？You can’t spend your whole life in the Filing Department or cooped up53 in your own apartment with all the doors and windows locked and the shades down. I’m not what you would call a drinker but I like to go out now and then for a drink or two in a nice place, even if I am by myself, I’m with Women’s Lib on that54 even though I can’t agree with a lot of the other things they say. Like here for instance, the waiters all know me and if anyone, you know, bothers me…….. I don’t know why I’m telling you all this, except I think it helps you get to know a person, especially at first, hearing some of the things they think about. At work they call me the office worry wart55, but it isn’t so much like worrying, it’s more like figuring out what you should do in an emergency, like I said before.

Anyway, another thing about it is that there’s a lot of conversation, in fact I spend most of my time, in the fantasy that is, wondering what I’m going to say and what he’s going to say, I think it would be better if you could get a conversation going. Like, how could a fellow do that to a person he’s just had a long conversation with, once you let them know you’re human, you have a life too, I don’t see how they could go ahead with it, right? I mean, I know it happens but I just don’t understand it, that's the part I really don’t understand.♦

50. pull up：使得…..…..停住。  short當副詞使用等於abruptly。

51. come to terms with……….（尤指在情感及智識上）去調整、適應或接受………..。

52. perish the thought：do not even think about it. 口語上表達真的希望某事不會發生，甚至連考慮都不想去考慮。

53. coop up：禁閉或困住於狹隘的地方或空間。

54.Women’s Lib：女權運動。

55. worry wart：Someone who worries excessively and needlessly杞人憂天、庸人自擾的人。

【淺嚐賞味】

這篇故事以戲劇獨白（dramatic monologue）形式呈現。戲劇獨白為英詩中的一種技巧（最著名代表作當首推Robert Browning的My Last Duchess），故事裡的一個人物對著其他角色述說，而由其述說構成整篇故事。從敘事者Estelle全然主觀的敘說中，暴露敘事者的人格、性情與對事物的看法。因此讀者更需要對其述說做自己的解讀與判斷，且往往在故事敘述與讀者判斷之間產生反諷的效果。

週五晚上於多倫多的一間小酒吧，Estelle對著一位不知名的男酒伴獨自述說著這整篇故事的內容。故事人物共六位：Estelle、一直沒出聲的傾聽者和Estelle的四位同事Chrissy、Sondra、Darlene及Greta。其中提到九則強姦幻想，Greta及Chrissy各說一則，而Estelle一個人就講了七則。

故事的主題當然是“強姦幻想”，起因是報章雜誌電視等大眾媒體炒作這題材。這篇故事寫作約在1977年左右，1970年代社會大眾包括警察司法體系對於強姦罪行及受害者，仍普遍存在許多落伍及錯誤的觀念。Estelle首先對於媒體炒作及大眾盲從表示不以為然，但是她的批判是輕佻、膚淺的。拿癌症疫苗及新髮型做嘲諷式的比喻，結論卻是：這又不是什麼新鮮事。從第一段就顯示敘事者的語調（tone）是譏諷的（sarcastic）。Estelle自以為是，但又跳脫不出世俗窠臼的刻板觀念（stereotype）。就此而論，作者的語調可以說是反諷的（ironic）。

當Greta及Chrissy各自說出她們的強姦幻想（兩人都是愛比較衣著的金髮年輕女郎），Estelle用：“就像個泰山”、“有人洗澡穿衣服的嗎？”等言詞奚落。她駁斥說那不是強姦幻想，而是性幻想。Estelle說強姦應當是罪犯拿著刀或什麼的逼迫受害者。她這點是講對了，可是輪到她述說其強姦幻想，還不是一樣充滿謬誤遐思，比較前面兩人高明不到哪裡去。誠如首段所示，Estelle自以為比他人優越，欲提出獨特見解，卻處處充滿醬缸的腐敗味道卻不自覺。

除了在公司午餐時與同事提到的那則塑膠檸檬的強姦幻想，Estelle在酒吧裡對那名沉默的傾聽者劈里啪啦地說出另六則強姦幻想，包括：(1)高高的Mr. Clean；(2)褲子拉鍊卡住的傢伙；(3)重感冒的強暴犯；(4)聽見天使聲音要殺她的強暴犯；(5)她變成功夫高手刺眼擊退的強暴犯；(6)同樣罹患白血症的強暴犯。共通點在於她能掌控情勢，且對於罪犯寄以同情，甚至認為這些罪犯也過著正常生活，愛看深夜節目。她未免也太天真（naive），充滿似是而非的錯誤觀念。

Estelle為什麼長篇大論的講了這麼一大串？有些讀者認為Estelle察覺該名傾聽者對她有性侵犯的意圖，所以說了這麼一大堆來說服勸退他。另些讀者則認為正由於其幼稚與愚蠢，反而將自己陷於不利的境地（意思是說誘使該傾聽者去強暴她），此之謂情境上的反諷（situational irony）。但也有可能如她自嘲公司同事都說她老愛庸人自擾、杞人憂天，是她想太多了，在多倫多市的酒吧，旁邊都是熟識的人，有可能發生什麼事？除非她單獨跟該酒伴到別的地方，或者她正有此意而防患未然，那就真的是玩火自焚。

故事裡有一個重要的隱喻：橋牌遊戲（the game of bridge）。Margaret Atwood在她短篇小說中時常使用到遊戲（game）此意象，遊戲象徵人與人之間的互動溝通，其中牽涉暗語、代碼與策略的運用。故事前頭Estelle抱怨Sondra弄不懂她的梅花暗號，其實Estelle又何嘗瞭解Sondra。Estelle老愛用自己的觀點去測度、解釋他人，卻又充滿刻版偏見。例如她形容Chrissy像全身擦滿指甲油，又說Greta自以為像個作戰英雄，她又去偷窺Darlene的人事檔案，41歲離婚多年（為了證實她什麼樣的測度解釋）。Estelle這麼理解Sondra沒說出其強姦幻想：當話題開始時Sondra若有所思，當Greta與Chrissy說完時Estelle立刻插了進去，Sondra來不及說，不久午餐結束Sondra想說也沒得說。

這故事裡只有Darlene跟Sondra沒述說其強姦幻想。Darlene是位年長離婚婦女，認為這話題非常噁心，掉頭離開後卻又忍不住來湊熱鬧，發表一些陳腔濫調例如女孩子不該夜晚外出，若是她碰到那種情形會死命地尖叫。Sondra除了前頭驚訝地問：“什麼幻想？”“你是說，有個男人從小巷裡跳出來撲向你，這種事嗎？”之後一直沒再發言。敘事者有點得意有點嘲諷地認為那是因為Sondra沒機會講，Estelle又在武斷地猜測理解他人。另一種可能的解讀是Sondra曾經親身經歷或者她知道真正的強姦是怎樣的情形，那種驚嚇與創痛是讓人久久說不出話來的（甚至有些受害者長達十數年躲避退縮到自我的心理防衛機制中，無法言說），哪還會像她們這樣風花雪月、自以為是地夸夸其談。

Traveler-Levin