The Heart Goes Last

Despite his status as one of the novel’s protagonists, Stan has very little agency or self-determination throughout the text and spends most of his time either making excuses for what is happening to him, or being easily coerced into something he does not want to do. This lack of control butts up against his ideas about masculinity and how he thinks he should exist in the world, leaving him feeling emasculated and unhappy.

This is evident from the start of the novel, when he has trouble hiding his resentment toward the fact that Charmaine is able to find work while he cannot, but recurs later when Jocelyn begins using him for sex and forces him to repeatedly watch and re-enact videos of Charmaine’s affair with Max—ironically inverting the power fantasies he has had about Jasmine. Stan’s internalized ideas about masculinity manifest in other toxic ways as well: He routinely objectifies women (his first thought upon meeting a new woman is always about their physical appearance and sexual desirability) and expresses anti-gay sentiments on several occasions.

All of this adds up to a character that is dull and largely unlikeable by design, and Margaret Atwood employs him (along with Charmaine, who suffers from different, but parallel issues) as a vehicle to progress the increasingly outrageous plot.