The Handmaid's Tale Book Review
Provocative,
startling, prophetic, and more relevant than ever, the acclaimed dystopian
novel by Canadian author Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale has become a
global phenomenon. The book tells the story of Offred, a Handmaid in the
Republic of Gilead, where women are prohibited from holding jobs, reading, and
forming friendships. She serves in the household of the Commander and his wife,
and under the new social order she has only one purpose: once a month, she must
lie on her back and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant.
The Handmaid's Tale is what Atwood calls speculative fiction,
meaning it theorizes about possible futures. This is a fundamental
characteristic shared by both utopian and dystopian texts. The possible
futures in Atwood's novels are usually negative, or dystopian, where the
actions of a small group have destroyed society as we know it.
As a Dystopian novel, on the other hand, The Handmaid's Tale is
not necessarily predictions of apocalyptic futures, but rather warnings about
the ways in which societies can set themselves on the path to destruction.
The Handmaid's Tale was published in 1985, when many
conservative groups attacked the gains made by the second-wave feminist
movement. This movement had been advocating greater social and legal equality
for women since the early 1960s. The Handmaid's Tale imagines a future in which
the conservative counter-movement gains the upper hand and not only demolishes
the progress women had made toward equality, but makes women completely
subservient to men.
Gilead divides women in the regime into distinct social
classes based upon their function as status symbols for men. Even their
clothing is color-coded. Women are no longer allowed to read or move about
freely in public, and fertile women are subject to state-engineered rape in
order to give birth to children for the regime.
Unlike a lot of contemporary dystopian tales that pack in as
much action and heroism as they can squeeze into a few hundred pages, The Handmaid’s Tale is more of a sociological
perception of the world we live in, or more so, the world we could live in. It looks at the gender divide and
offers surprisingly accurate insights into how the world (sadly) works, despite
the fact that it’s set in a dystopian future.
The Handmaid's Tale Summary
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret
Atwood the novel is set in the future where the United
States of America has been replaced by a new totalitarian state called the
Republic of Gilead. Gilead rose to power because they wanted to put a stop to
the vast amounts of readily available porn prostitution and the amount of
violence towards women.
Gilead
is a totalitarian theocracy meaning it's a dictatorship run by a religious
group on Eraser offer it is a handmade one of the limited number of fertile
women left in America who have been collected stripped of their human rights
and forced to bear children to the elite we follow our fringe journey as she
attempts to survive this brave new world intermittently learning about her life
before through a series of flashbacks.
The
novel is set in a future version of the United States specifically Cambridge
Massachusetts. Most of the population is sterile and birth rates have massively
declined due to rising environmental degradation and sexually transmitted
diseases claiming their desire to halt the declining birth rate. As their
motivation the sons of Jacob have used military force to overthrow the Liberal
Democratic American government and organizer new patriarchal society centered
around reproduction.
The
main character's name is Offred which is not her real name but she says that no
one is allowed to call her by her real name anymore because her name is
forbidden she is a handmaid and his job in Gilead is to be assigned to married
couples in order to bear their children.
Offred
is assigned to the commander and his wife Serena Joy and they look like this
probably every month when Offred is at the right part of her menstrual cycle
she is required to have personal impersonal worthless sex with the commander. However
when this is taking place Serena is required to sit behind her holding her
hands and there isn't a lot of talking or eye contact and it's a bit awkward and it's quite hard to draw
yeah and yes.
The
novel uses a series of threads flashbacks to clarify what has happened in the
years leading up to present day we find out that she has had an affair with a
married man named Luke who had a daughter. We also find out that Offred was
raised by her mother who had been a feminist activist and she had a best friend
called Moira who was a tenacious rebellious lesbian who refuses to stand up
against Gilead.
One
day offered was turned away from her job she discovered that the sons of Jacob
had overtaken the government through military force and had made it illegal for
women to work and property Luke and Offred attempted to escape to Canada before
their daughter was taken from them as since Luke was a divorcee their marriage was
voided they were caught an Offred was taken to the red centre which is as scary
as it sounds in the red centre women were indoctrinated and trained to be
handmaids through violence coercion and biblical teachings.
She
becomes a handmaid and is sent to a Commanders house where she meets him and
his wife, Serena Joy. There, she is forced to have sex with the Commander
monthly in order to bear children because of the drastically low birth rates.
In this house, she is not allowed to move without permission but does go on
frequent shopping trips with another handmaid, Ofglen.
Even
in public, every citizen is watched secretly by the “Eyes”. Secretly, Ofglen
introduces Offred to “Mayday” an underground group of rebellions. Offred is
also introduced to Nick, a Guardian, in the Commander’s house as the Commander
sends messages to Offred secretly. The Commander invites Offred to play
scrabble with him, an illegal activity, and like this they form a relationship.
However, a piteous one, as the Commander does this to fill his need of
companionship and to make Offred’s life in the house bearable.
In
addition, Nick and Offred also develop a small relationship which is further
enhanced as Serena asks them both to have sex in order for Offred to become
pregnant. Serena is interested in this pregnancy because she desires to raise a
child of her own and ensures that this will happen when she promises to show
Offred the picture of her daughter, whom Offred now knows is still alive.
Offred
also secretly has sex with the Commander as he takes her into a hotel and asks
her to pretend to be a prostitute. In this hotel, Offred meets Moira, and
learns that she also works in the cheap hotel and in the end she has to submit
to the government regardless of her wishes. Hearing this, Offred loses all
hopes because she realizes that her living daughter will never recognize her,
she has been disloyal to her husband, and her fate will be similar to Moira’s
as she will also have to submit to the government.
As
all this continues, Offred discovers that Ofglen has been replaced because the
previous one was caught in her subversive activities and hanged herself before
getting caught. Soon after, a black van, a signature of the “eyes” comes to
take Offred away. Nick tells her to go as they are really “Mayday”. After this,
her fate remains unknown. We don't know whether she's taken to freedom or
execution the story finishes with an epilogue.
This
is a pretty dense text as we watch offered grappling with extreme misogyny
religious extremism and the loss of her daughter and a hideous new outfit were
invited to speculate on just how dangerous apathy to the world around us could
be and how many of us may take her own freedom for granted.
5 Best The Handmaid's Tale Quotes
1. “Ignoring isn’t the same as ignorance, you have to work at it.”
2. “We were the people who were not in the papers. We lived in the blank white spaces at the edges of print. It gave us more freedom. We lived in the gaps between the stories.”
3. “Don't let the bastards grind you down.”
4. “A rat in a maze is free to go anywhere, as long as it stays inside the maze.”
5. “But who can remember pain, once it’s over? All that remains of it is a shadow, not in the mind even, in the flesh. Pain marks you, but too deep to see. Out of sight, out of mind.”
