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Chapters 13 & 14

Summary: Chapter 13: Values

An emaciated, frantic Evey concludes that V has somehow simulated her entire imprisonment. When Evey demands that V explain why, he tells her it’s because he loves her and wants to set her free. He says that everyone in their oppressive, fascist society, including Evey, her parents, and Gordon, has always been imprisoned. He adds that because Evey refused to sacrifice her principles, even when threatened with death, she’s now free. V then leads Evey to the roof. Bald and naked, she stands in the rain as V tells her to become “transfixed” and “transfigured.” 

Summary: Chapter 14: Vignettes

Evey kisses V while he sits at the piano in the Shadow Gallery. V assures her that Valerie was real and that she wrote her letter while imprisoned in room IV at Larkhill Resettlement Camp. At the Kitty-Kat Keller, Rose reluctantly continues her new job as a cabaret dancer. Leader Susan screams when he receives a note on Fate’s screen reading, “I LOVE YOU.” V later tells Evey to prepare herself for an impending finale.

Analysis: Chapters 13 & 14

The book's insistence on the conflation of V's love for Evey and the torture he inflicts upon her is unavoidably problematic. While the impulse to make someone prove their integrity and commitment is to some degree, understandable, the use of mental and physical torture cannot be viewed with the same general shrug that the book seems to suggest is warranted. The general attitude of the artistic value of torturing women is less acceptable and more criticized now than it was when V for Vendetta was published in the 1980s. That the male protagonist takes it upon himself to inflict similar horrors as those committed against him in his imprisonment is a continuation of a cycle of violence that lands poorly with the reader. The idea that a utopian future based on the importance of the public's self-determination begins with the abuse of a woman cannot help but necessarily taint the outcome. Even if the reader agrees with the importance of the principle of individual liberty and self-determination, the path by which Evey arrives at the most realized version of herself is a journey that should be thoughtfully and critically considered.

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