Flowering Judas

Laura is the protagonist, and her inner thoughts and internal struggles propel the narrative forward. Much of the conflict in “Flowering Judas” centers around Laura’s identity crisis as she questions her place in the Revolution and her faith in the cause. She is full of contradictions and does not have one guiding sense of principles or ideals to lead her; she is committed to the Socialist cause but still visits church and prays, yet her mind drifts to the physical aspects of the altar—its “tinsel flowers and ragged brocades” (Paragraph 6)—rather than opening itself to faith. The only thing she is described as loving throughout the story is fine lace, a weakness that is counter to the ideals of Socialism. She hides both her religious devotions and her lace away from anyone who would see them—an example of hypocrisy in a work deeply concerned with Betrayal of Self and Others.

Laura judges herself harshly for these failures, referring to her love of lace as “heresy.” However, her real malaise goes much deeper. Laura is anxious throughout the story; she is fearful of the future and is described as feeling “a slow chill, a purely physical sense of danger, a warning in her blood that violence, mutilation, a shocking death wait for her” (Paragraph 9).