Discussion Questions

Discussion Questions: Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake

We made these up ourselves! If you don't see any you like, there's another set of discussion questions near the bottom of the page.


1. In many ways, Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake can be read as an social critique of our contemporary culture through the lens of ecofeminism (see blog, under “Reading in Context: Issues to Think About in Oryx and Crake” for details on ecofeminism). In what ways does Atwood critique Big Science, capitalism, the class system (note the division of classes in the novel: the privileged live in compounds separated from the underprivileged pleeblanders), mass media (i.e. television, the gaming culture, and internet), technology, human trafficking and the sex trade, the treatment of nature and animals, hierarchies, and the socialization of gendered roles/norms?

2. How do you account for Atwood’s depiction of Jimmy’s mother (who is demonized by Jimmy and his father)? How did you initially feel about her, and did those feelings change as the novel progressed?

3. In what ways does Jimmy’s father try to socialize him into societal norms/definitions of masculinity or manhood? Did you notice any gendered roles among the Crakers? What can account for these? Were you surprised that strict gender roles still seemed important to the people of the future?

4. Much of Jimmy/Snowman’s thinking and behaviors are comparable to that of a sociopath. Read the definition and/or characteristics of a sociopath on the blog (under the “Reading in Context: Issues to Think About in Oryx and Crake”) and apply these to Jimmy/Snowman. Do they apply to Crake?

5. In what ways did the Oryx character function in the novel? Did you believe the things she told Jimmy? In some ways, if we accept Oryx’s accounts as truth, she seems to have developed a kind of Stockholm’s syndrome perspective of her captors when she was victim of the sex trade/human trafficking. Discuss this issue. Do you think Jimmy or Crake genuinely loved her? Explain.

6. Discuss Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs in reference to the novel (the privileged groups living in compounds, the pleeblanders, and Crakers). See the information on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs on the blog for further information (under the “Reading in Context: Issues to Think About in Oryx and Crake”).

7. What did you make of the red parrot? What was its’ significance?

8. What was the significance of Jimmy’s nickname, “Snowman?”

9. How guilty/involved/responsible did you feel that Crake was for occurrences at the end of the novel? Do you think he manipulated Oryx and Jimmy/Snowman for his plans?

10. What future do you foresee for the Crakers? Will their society be better (in terms of hierarchies, racism, sexism, classism, oppression, etc.) than a human one? Discuss.

11. Atwood says Oryx and Crake "is speculative fiction, not science fiction." Read the genre descriptions of both. Is this a work of science fiction? What reasons (marketability, academic clout) might Atwood have to attempt to distance herself from the label of "sci-fi?"

12. Read the negative review of Orxy and Crake from scifi.com (in blog). Do you agree/disagree with the points made? Is this work good feminist speculative fiction but bad sci-fi? Is there a high brow/low brow divide here? A gendered divide?

13. Read the common formula for dystopic narrative from the blog. In what ways does Oryx and Crake conform to this formula? In what ways does it differ?