The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood, is a profound and futuristic novel in the eyes of women. Due to the despicable and compromising situations the women had to face, I realized how fortunate women are now to have the privileges that the women of Gilead were forced to give up. In my opinion this novel, though published in the late eighties, does in a way mirror today's world. Today, women in many foreign countries have to succumb to the atrocities that Offred faced. Overall I liked this book, for the simple fact that it illustrated what women should not take for granted: permission to read, write, hold a job, and most of all love.
Margaret Atwood, was born November 18, 1939, in Canada. She began writing at the age of sixteen. In 1957 she attended Victoria University in the University of Toronto and received a Bachelor of Arts in English. During her career as a novelist and poet, she has written many works in a plethora of genres. Atwood has achieved many awards including the Booker Prize, Arthur C. Clarke Award, and received the Governor General's Award twice. For The Handmaid's Tale she was awarded the Arthur C. Clarke Award and the Governor General's Award, not to mention the novel becoming a motion picture in 1990. Margaret Atwood currently lives in Toronto with her husband Graeme Gibson.
"As for my husband, she said, he's just that. My husband. I want that to be perfectly clear. Till death do us part. It's final" (16).
I chose this quote because I thought it accurately depicted the relationship between the Wives and the Handmaids. The Handmaids weren't there to form a loving relationship with the Commander. The Wives perceived the situation as a business transaction and not an affair. Furthermore the quote shows the Commander's wife's possessive persona. She literally tells Offred that although she is carrying her husband's child that doesn't mean she is his wife.
Offred (narrator/Handmaid)
Commander
Commander's Wife (Serena Joy)
Nick (Commander's chaffeur)
Luke (Offred's husband)
Ofglen (Handmaid)
Rita (Martha)
Cora (Martha)
Aunt Lydia
"One of them is vastly pregnant... our fingers itch to touch her... an object of envy and desire... showing us what can still be done: we too can be saved" (26).
I picked this quote because it helps illustrate the main focus of the Republic of Gilead (formerly the U.S.) that women must procreate in order to stay alive. Handmaids who became pregnant with the Commander's child were given special privileges. However, if the Handmaids were found to be sterile they were called Unwomen and were taken to the colonies to do hard labor. In this futuristic time women were seen as objects; seen and not heard.
"Some did it themselves... with chemicals. How could they, said Aunt Lydia... Jezebels! Scorning God's gifts... some women believed there would be no future... said there was no sense in breeding... such wickedness. They were lazy women, she says. They were sluts" (112-113).
I selected this quote because it shows how the Aunts, the women who disciplined the girls, teach them to become vessels if they were not sterile. In this quote, Aunt Lydia preaches to the girls that before the Republic of Gilead formed women intentionally harmed their bodies, so they wouldn't be able to do what God intended for them- reproducing. Offred realizes that the Aunts are trying to brain wash them, and take away their once treasured independence. Offred also finds that most of the women sent to become Handmaids have killed themselves, for they find that ending their misery is much better than continuing the degrading jobs placed on them.