How we cite our quotes: (Book.Section.Paragraph)
Quote #4
"Keep an eye on the InnerCircle feed in particular, because that's where you'll hear about staff meetings, mandatory gatherings, and any breaking news. If there's a Circle notice that's really pressing, that'll be marked in orange. Something extremely urgent will prompt a message on your phone, too. You keep that in view? […] So those are your priorities, with your fourth priority your own OuterCircle participation. Which is just as important as anything else, because we value your work-life balance, you know, the calibration between your online life here at the company and outside it." (1.12.87)
When Mae Holland first joins the Circle, she's impressed by how much the company seems to value the fact that its employees have lives outside their jobs. The Circle encourages its employees to feel free to be themselves and to explore and participate actively in the world around them, but there's just one catch: Circlers should never be so selfish as to keep any of their experiences to themselves. If they aren't actively sharing their lives with the company, they aren't being good community members. So, how free are they, really?
Quote #5
Mae was feeling dull-witted, her body reluctant to do anything but recline. She had been, she realized, on constant alert for a full week, and hadn't slept more than five hours on any given night. Simply sitting in her parents' dim living room, watching this basketball game, which meant nothing to her, all those ponytails and braids leaping, all that squeaking of sneakers, was restorative and sublime. (1.20.3)
However much the Circle claims to value its employees' work-life balance, the truth is that the company sucks people dry. After a full week at the Circle, Mae Holland finds it utterly freeing to sit around and do nothing for an afternoon. The Circle may tell its employees that they're free to choose the level of their own involvement on campus, but that's not really the case. As Mae discovers, Circlers have a lot less freedom than the company leads them to believe.
Quote #6
Mae called her parents, telling her mom first, then her dad, and there was some whooping, and there were tears, more praise for Annie as the savior of the family, and some very embarrassing talk about how Mae had become a real adult, how her parents were ashamed and humbled to be leaning on her, leaning so heavily on their young daughter in this way, it's just this messed-up system we're all stuck in, they said. But thank you, they said, we're so proud of you. (1.24.43)
Although Mae Holland believes that she's freed her parents from an enormous burden of worry by having them added to the Circle's medical plan, her parents soon realize that when freedom comes from the Circle, it comes with some heavy strings attached.