Motifs are recurring structures, contrasts, or literary devices that can help to develop and inform the text’s major themes.

The Tear

Several times in the novel, Mae feels a tear inside her. It’s described as a rip in some black space within her. The feeling doesn’t last long, but when she closes her eyes, she feels the tear opening wider, and hears the screams of a “million invisible souls.” These moments happen when she’s at her desk trying to manage all her social feeds, answer questions, and be available to the hundreds of actual souls trying to get her attention, while at the same time having a real thought about something currently bothering her. In one instance, Mae is thinking about Kalden and how she can’t find any information on him in CircleSearch, the Circle’s online directory. Again, she feels the tear when her webcam catches her mother and father having sex and Bailey refuses to delete the footage. These moments appear to be a version of a panic attack since they happen when Mae feels overwhelmed. As she comes up against what can’t be known and all the things that have to be known, right at that moment, a tear opens, and Mae is forced to go inward for a moment.

The Seals

Mae is often out on the water in the bay kayaking. It’s her chosen activity to relax when her life becomes stressful. Each time Mae is on the water, seals appear. In the first instance, she and the seals pleasantly take each other in. The moment feels calming and fulfilling for Mae. However, as her life gets more and more hectic within the Circle, the meetings between her and the seals change. After having a frustrating run-in with Mercer at her parents where he criticizes her new job, saying the Circle manufactures social neediness, the seals Mae sees appear to “decide whether to look at her.” Later in the novel, after Mae’s transparency has catapulted her to the world stage, the seals seem to “follow her, deciding whether to look at her.” The seals mimic and reflect Mae’s growing self-consciousness as her life becomes more and more public and manufactured. 

Bathroom Encounters

Privacy becomes so threatened over the course of the novel that the only place Mae can find it is in the stalls in the bathroom. Before Mae goes fully “transparent,” the bathroom is where Kalden leads her to have a private sexual moment. He can’t be discovered since he’s been masquerading as someone else to keep his identity as one of the company’s leaders a secret from her. Later, Mae faces an emotional situation that she wants to keep private that forces her into the bathroom—she’s gone fully “transparent,” wearing a webcam strapped to her chest 24/7 that records her every move and word. The bathroom is the only place where she and Annie can have a private moment with the camera off. The location of these encounters highlights the absurdity of the extensive loss of privacy the Circle causes, as well as the gravity of the consequences Kalden faces if he’s found out to be Ty Gospodinov, the Circle’s founder.