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Handmaid’s tale
CONTEXT
SUMMARY OF MAIN CHAPTERS
FULLY WRITTEN ESSAY FOR CHAPTER 19
PRESENTATION OF THE AUNTS
STORYTELLING
CHARACTER ANALYSIS: NICK, COMMANDER, OFFRED
CONTEXT:
Margaret Atwood’s, The Handmaid’s Tale, was first published in 1986
...
Both political leaders
were supported by extreme religious conservatives who opposed and
criticized the Sexual Liberation Movement that began in the 1960’s
...
Atwood
utilized The Handmaid’s Tale as a cautionary tale to if women’s rights
became nonexistent
...
It prompted the
stigma developed around sex and the LGBT community
...

After 1966, President Ceausescu of Romania banned birth control and
abortion
...
Not-so-surprisingly, Romania suffered dire
consequences
...
This real life disastrous event
was used by Margaret Atwood to parallel Gilead’s laws on childbirth and
abortion
...
It’s because of the
pollution and the environmental hazards that caused the increasing

infertility rate
...
S
...


SUMMARY: The United States has fallen, overthrown by a theocratic
regime, founded on rigid Christian principles and the disempowerment of
women, which has installed a new nation called Gilead in its place
...
The scene changes to her current residence, where she lives
with a Commander and his wife, Serena Joy
...
In the evening,
Offred lies in bed
...
She
thinks about the previous Handmaid who left a Latin message scratched into
the wall
...
The
doctor suggested that her Commander might be sterile and offers to have
sex with her
...


KEY POINTS TO THINK:
The story may be a utopia for us, one approaching speculative
fiction but if the readers self-internalize themselves in the shoes
of Offred and considering that our present-day inequalities have
a correspondence to the book with decline in birth rate in some
countries, gender inequalities, abortion, anti-female political,
religious groups the readers shudder in dread that a right-wing

This paragraph
can be used as
a concluding
sentence when
writing essays
...
Atwood herself
source here
...


CHAPTER 1 Analysis:
‘’We’’

‘’once been a gymnasium’’

‘’were formerly’’ + ‘’were still in
place’’ + ‘’was of varnished’’

‘’ The floor was of varnished
wood…
...
The indefinite article
‘’we’’ starts the novel with a
conglomerative notion
...

This is known as the past perfect
progressive which has for effect to
illustrate the passing of time
...

Offred seems to behave in a
nostalgic manner
...

In fact, the use of past tense
subjugates the reader under an
ambiguous timeframe as she
amalgams the present with the past
which increases the nostalgic mood
...
The
emphasis on elucidating the objects’
characteristics and forms is
according to psychanalysis a form
of coping mechanism to stay sane
...

Furthermore, Offred descriptive
linguist here is hyperbolic as she

exaggerates hoe over time the
gymnasium has deteriorated through
the years, which constructs a
sinister tone
...

‘’smell’’
The olfactory detail here adds a
touch of realism as the use of
sensory detail make the reader feel
as if they are in the ‘’gymnasium’’
‘’like an afterimage’’
The suggestion of something that
has been erased but left a trace is
an allusion to the past
...

The simile also suggests that just
like the smell which is fading away,
Offred memories are fading away
as well
‘’pungent smell of sweat’’ V/s ‘’sweet The reders note the juxtaposition
taint of chewing gum and perfume
of olfactory details between
from the girls’’
‘’pungent’’ smell from the boys and
‘’sweet’’ from the girls
...
This prepares us
for the upcoming contrast between
roles, responsibilities and qualities
of man and woman
...
Here,
the narrator suggests that the past
has been overlaid by the present
...

This create a creepy image because
the ‘’watching girls’’ is a metaphor
for the ghost of the past
The use of hyponyms by mentioning
‘’felt-skirted’’, ‘’mini-skirts’’ and
‘’pants’’ are all words which alludes
to the hypernym clothes
...

In fact, the change in fashion from
more modest to bolder is
representative of the history of
women’s rights movement
...

The idea that sex was a normal
activity done on a daily basis ca be
seen here
...
Furthermore, this is
a reference to sexual emancipation,
sexual freedom, youth having sex
and girls engaging in sexual acts on
their own accords
...
This
shows the passiveness that
surrounds Offred lifestyles in the
present which further makes us pity
her as clearly the lack of active
movement shows her repressive
state
...
Atwood appears
to juxtapose dystopia with utopia
here as the normalcy of what we as
21st century reader feels by the
past here is contrasted with the
unnormal feeling of what Offred
feels by recounting past memories
...
Thus, what is
dystopic for us is normal for
Offred but what is utopic for her is
normal for us
...
The idea of
naming from here become a
recurrent motif
...
The after-sex let
down + That yearning - The speaker
realises that her past young
romantic fantasies never quite lived
up to expectation

Sex at that time was different sex without expectation or duties
or in the television room with the
Is the narrator fantasizing an
sound turned down and only the
imaginary event or reliving a scene
pictures flickering over lifting flesh
...

Naive, youthful exuberance for a
future filled with prospects
...

Use of diacope- the past remains
even I the present- though it may
be blurred the past always leave a
trace that is impossible to erase
Military euphemisms + Hyponym of
military to suggest the hypernym of
regimentation
...
Double entendre here – the
idea of doubling

‘’spaces between’’

Aunt Sara and Aunt Elizabeth

could not be trusted

The emphasis on leaving spaces inbetween the handmaid highlight the
importance of divisiveness and
separation between the women- if
they are together and form a
commune-like family, this will be
dangerous to the regime as,
collective rebellion may happen
...
The
subsequent juxtaposition of aunts
carrying cattle prods is jarring
...
Sara was the mother
of nations, wife of Abraham, who
gave her maidservant Hagar to
Abraham to have children and
conceive the new nation ()
...
A lot of childlessness
going round
...
' Our
expectations are undermined
...
The
government of the state of Gilead
is never explicitly identified in the
novel
...
As bad as the

electric cattle prods

Aunts are, there’s something worse
waiting outside
...
Throughout this chapter, the
importance of gender roles, as well
as a hierarchy, is seen
...
The
hierarchy is seen in the manner
that leadership is coordinated, and
how power is distributed

by a chain-link fence topped with
barbed wire
...


Angels have abandoned or forsaken
the handmaids
...
Or perhaps cannot see them
...
This is a double
reference to the guards called
“Angels” and also the angels of
heaven
...

How ironic that in such a place,
with strict rules based on
evangelical principles, the handmaids
would be cursed and shunned by
God’s messengers
...
+ Guns … for … the Angels As with the Aunts, our expectations
of the word ‘Angel' are undermined
...

- The word ‘exchanged' is
frequently used in the novel, and
becomes significant, suggesting the
importance of human inter-action
...
Given that these young
women are to become, effectively,
sex-slaves, it is ironic that the
speaker feels this is a ‘fantasy'
...


Despite their fear, the Handmaids,
especially Offred, still have a shred
of curiosity
...
The
Handmaids have no possessions,
their only thing of value are their
bodies
...
If only we
could talk to them
...

That was our fantasy
...
In the semidarkness we could stretch out our
arms, when the Aunts weren't
looking, and touch each other's
hands across space
...
from bed to bed

This foreshadows their underground
interactions in the story beyond the
gymnasium, when they interact in
the grocery store and eventually
form a resistance
...


Alma
...
Dolores
...

June
...
Atwood has
commented on this saying that it
isn’t what she intended but that it
does fit into the story well +
...
+ We exchanged
names
...
g
...

These names are important as these
are five identities that have been
wiped, and we have to figure out
who they are
...
At this point of the
novel, we do not know the
significance of these names, but
the short syllable of ‘June’ could
make us wonder whether this has
either more significant, or no
significance, in the story
The women assert their memories
and their personhood by rebelling,

in an act as simple as telling each
other their names
...
Floating through the grim, Byzantine setting are afterimages
of the past, when teams played basketball on the court
...

Atwood infuses the scene with sights and smells and sexuality of
teenagers of the past era by emphasizing sense imagery
...

The method failed to delete the original text, which cropped up in
words and letters that recalled fragments of a former message
...
A cadre of female supervisors bearing the comforting title
of "Aunt" patrols like sadistic Amazons
...

The illusion of protection, symbolized by barbed wire atop the chainlink fence, leaves the unsettling question of the inmates' status: are
they being nurtured or imprisoned?
Their names imply an answer — Alma, which is Latin for nurturing,
or kindly; Delores, which comes from the Latin word for grief, and
June, reflecting the Roman Juno, goddess of marriage and the
family
...
Likewise, the aunts, Sara and Elizabeth, bear Old
Testament names reflecting motherhood — Sarah, Hebrew
for princess, the elderly woman who became the mother of the
Hebrew nation; and Elizabeth, the aged parent of John the Baptist,
forerunner of Christ
...
Like the stripes and circles that outline the basketball
court, the rules that govern Gilead create an inflexible, authoritarian
environment in which punishment for infractions is swift and
arbitrary
...
After
her predecessor's suicide, the family removed the light fixture,
leaving only an empty, but meaning-packed circle
...
Indeed, they signify
possession and therefore
foreshadows that this chapter will
talk about how she is owned and
how she herself is property
...

The room described as being very
minimalistic– this is due to
Handmaids not being allowed to have
possessions
...
They are
not allowed possessions but they are
allowed to be possessions
themselves
...
She handicaps the
personified ceiling here to highlight
the removal of escapism for an eye
has the ability to see and now that
it cannot see, it cannot escape
...
It
seems that she is also a possession
in regards to how her right to die
has been owed by the state and
carefully controlled
...


‘’They’ve removed’’, ‘’they like’’

We note that two bars which
separate this sentence from the
whole paragraph creates a
distancing effect because this
phrase which alludes to her being
constantly watched shows her
disconnection and distance from the
outside world who cannot trust her
even in the private quarters of her
room
...
The anonymity of the
people just like Offred anonymous
real name is quite disturbing
...

Clearly someone has done their best
to make sure that the room is
rebel-proof, as safe as a prison but
more attractive
...

Atwood seems to create an
extended allusion to Virginia Wolf
‘’woman through the looking glass’’ +
a window has the property of being
transparent and fragile which

‘’I can sit…watch this…I can
smell…touch’’

‘’folk art, archaic’’

‘’waste not want not
...
Why do I want?’’

exactly correspond to Offed who
has a transparent existence and
whose fragility dependent from
being a handmaid make her life a
living hell
...
It highlights her
repressive state for her senses are
restricted to sit, watch, smell and
touch only hat has been allowed to
her
...
” These women and
art are both decorative and
pointless, leftovers that have been
used up
...
Theme of femininity
...
The idea of
not wasting but being wasted is
significant as Offred’s body is
certainly being made of use rather
than being ignored
...


Furthermore, the second polyptoton
of ‘’want not’’ is referring to Gilead
pressure on any handmaid to only do
her needs and to abstain from
wants and here Offred questioning
if she has the right to want
something from considering society’s
norms, she is fulfilling her purpose
shows how she has been
indoctrinated into the values of
Gilead
...

‘’a return to traditional values’’

‘’blue irises, water-colour’’

When Atwood was writing the book,
the slogan ‘’Make America great’’
with presidential election took place
and many televangelists- the
Baptists- would preach politics and
religion such as banning abortion to
save the morality of the family
...
It
seems that Atwood was against
tele-preaching as well as archaic
values
...

We note the use of pleonasm as she
already mentions that the irises are
blue but then continue to put what
many considers as unnecessary
details by stating that it is ‘’water-

‘’the same print, the same chair,
the same white curtains’’

‘’ I try not to think too much
...
There’s a lot that doesn’t
bear thinking about
...


colour’’
...
The idea of sacrifice
through the imagery of the blue
flower seems to be depicted here
...
Atwood seems to
correlates sacrifice with
reproduction; stating that
reproducing in this state has become
a sacrifice and not a pleasure which
further the theme of
repressiveness
...
Offred
questions if this is a ‘’government
issue’
...

The use of polyptoton by varying
words such as ‘’think’’, ‘’thought’’,
‘’thinking’’
...
In fact, the word
‘’rationed’’ which translates to
control of distributions and
stockings shows that the state
wishes not only to control one’s
actions but also the distinct and
stocked thoughts of one’s mind
...
While Offred state that
she must think less to survive, the
phonetic here clearly shows that she
is doing the opposite since here her
thoughts and mental stimulation can
be seen as psychological rebellion
...
The harshness of the
reality where the fact that they
have to remove ways of suicide,
something seen to be freedom for
the handmaid shows that death is
better than life- the notion that
death I am deliverance from the
harshness of life is a biblical notion
but the full irony is that it is the
bible itself-or more like its
perversion-which creates hardship
that leads to the want of suicide
The word ‘’cutting’’ and ‘’open’’ with
‘’yourself’’ and ‘’edge’’ create an
imagery of suicide where one cut
himself open and blead to death
...
This
strikes us as a pervasive sentence
highlighting that the room is not
individualized or welcoming
...
The word ‘’house’’ is

‘’For ladies in reduced
circumstances…The circumstances
have been reduced’’

‘’I am alive, I live, I breathe’’

significant of lack of companionship
or warm since it is not a ‘’home’’
where they get affection and love
...

The use of chiasm- reversal of
word order- can be seen here as
Atwood play on the syntax of the
sentence
...
She indirectly blames
Gilead for her misery, again a form
of psychological rebellion
...

For Offred it is not only her
financial independency but hr
...

The asyndetic listings here is full of
euphemisms of survival
...
The
constant remembrance that she is
still alive is a recurrent motif of
sanity and thus a coping mechanism
...
The nurturing that

‘’Where I am is not a prison but a
privilege’’

‘’Aunt Lydia said’’

Either/or

‘’Time here is measured by bells’’
+’’few mirrors’’

‘’As in a nunnery’’

Gilead gives her is less powerful
than her nature to stick to her
instincts
...
Sunlight
is a symbol of hope
...

The emphasis on the negation ‘’not’’
as well as the paradoxical definition
that Aunt Lydia gives to the words
‘’privilege’’ and ‘’prison’’ show how
Gilead perverts meanings of words
to suit their purposes
...

The subtle mocking of such a
serious topic shows her lack of
emotion
...
The lack of mirrors
highlights the stereotypical notion
of woman wanting to look good
...

The simile here suggests that
Offred lives in a cloistered
existence
...


‘’red shoes’’ + ‘’red gloves’’

‘’red: the colour of blood, which
defines us’’

‘’their red shoes’’ + ‘’I never looked
good in red’’ + ‘’I refuse to say my’’

The comparison to a nunnery is both
fitting, since Offred must live a
silent, spare lifestyle based on
religious principles, and wrong, since
she’s a sex worker
...
‘Red
shoes' therefore became for her an
icon of feminism, and the desire for
female independence
...

Red also alludes to blood which is an
extend to threat of death, pain and
suffering
...

The allusion to menstruation here
basically means that reproduction
defines a woman otherwise she does
not have any importance
The plural possessive pronoun shows
that she does not want to
appropriate things that are not

‘’I refuse to say my’’

‘’flat-heeled to save the spine’’

‘’ some fairytale figure in a red
cloak’’ + ‘’like a path through the
forest’’

hers
...
This
is because if she accepts what
Gilead gives to her, it alludes to her
lost spirit and total indoctrination
and acceptance to this society
...
She may not be able to
decide much else about her life but
she can control her possessive
pronouns
...
We see that she asserts her
individuality in such small ways
...
It
also links back to the idea that if
she called her room ‘hers’, she
would be in possession of something,
which would make her a felon in
Gilead
...
The
allusion to fertility is prominent
here
...
The lack of self-expression is
seen here as her metaphorical
language show a lack of emotion
...

The simile of the forest reminds us
of Little Red Riding Hood mother
who told her not to go in the forest
which reminds us of the Aunts
...

This era was known for its high
discriminative values towards
women
...

Late Victorian an architecture that
reflects the staid, family-cantered
mindset of Queen Victoria's reign,
which extended from 1837-1901
...

The use of polyptoton through the
variation of ‘’sitting’’ to ‘’sit’’
...
The
alternative positions highlight
hierarchy where the handmaid have
to obey the notion set for them
...
The simile of the

shadow
society
herself
shadow
past
...

Symbolically, it represents the
Commander's importance to Gilead's
spying operation and the prying eyes
that deprive Offred of privacy
...
The notion of
being ‘’dipped in blood’’ suggest a
horrific imagery of someone bathed
in blood either through a massacre
or a sacrifice
...
In
fact, the other half of their
appearance is seen as pure and
simple, as the other half of them is
white
...

Different colour defines contrast
social status which show how Gilead
is a state based on hierarchy
something that Karl Marx sees as
proof of the characteristic of a
capitalist society
...
This suggest that she is
someone pure
...

The colours, red and blue, suggest
patriotic bunting as well as the
free-floating hostility between the
Commander's Wife in blue and the
intrusive Handmaid in red

‘’usual Martha dress’’

‘’nobody much cares who sees the
face of a Martha’’

fanlight a half-circle of coloured
glass meant to add filtered
overhead sunlight as a further
adornment of the foyer
...
The new regime
which Atwood imagines to have
taken over the United States of
America appears to be
a theocracy (a society governed by
religious leaders)
...
In Luke 10:38-41 is an
account of Jesus visiting his
friends Martha and Mary of
Bethany
...

The lack of caring towards the
Martha show that the Handmaid are
above them in status and
importance
...
’’

‘’Go to the Colonies
...
If I
hadn't of got my tubes tied, it
could have been me, say I was ten
years younger
...

It's not what you'd call hard work
...

Since Offred has not conceived yet,
the whole house is affected by it
...
Rita and Offred
are both victims of the same antiwomen regime, but their internal
divisions mean that they won’t band
together and threaten Gilead
...

Atwood uses the ‘un' prefix in the
same way as did Orwell in his
dystopian novel 1984, where
language was restricted and ‘ungood'
meant ‘bad'
...

Cora’s comment reveals a problem
built into this new society, which is
the lack of respect between
Martha’s and Handmaids, and the
idea that the Handmaids have it
easy
...
This
is typical of women against women
...
Talking about such things
could be considered an insurgence
...

‘’I would like…Cora might…we would’’

‘’we would exchange’’

The use of modal verbs like might,
would and may suggest possibility or
here wishful thinking
...

There is no voluntary human
interaction something that
sociologists highlight leads to
anomie-confusion over the norms of
society
...

Here the narrator transmutes her
‘’hunger’’ for something edible to
what she wishes would nourish her
life: love
...


‘’ I know what you mean…I hear
where you’re coming from’’

‘’ why tempt her to friendship’’

‘’The Marthas are not supposed to
fraternize with us…there was no
corresponding word hat meant to
behave like a sister’’

‘’Stabbed her with a knitting
needle, right in her belly
...
The notion of
sameness here suggest she wants to
belong to a group where the women
will understand her
...

The rhetorical question here shows
that the women have accepted the
divisiveness between them
...

Even language seeks to alienate
women as it prioritises men
...
We also note
how Offred revels in the etymology
of words as it gives her some sense
of her old life back where she was
freely able to read and write
...
Even though
the Handmaids are the core of
Gilead and how it operates, due to
their fertility, they are
still dehumanized to a lower
hierarchical level
...
The use of
the past tense used in association
to Luke – Luke ‘told’ her, and Luke
‘said’, and not ‘says’ – rather than
the present tense, shows that he is
from “the time before” and not
from Gilead
...

Rita, at the end of this chapter,
sends Offred shopping for eggs and
chicken – this brings up the idea of
birth, and the cliché of “what came
first, the chicken or the egg?”
Hints of military control

NOTE: that Offred’s narrative is talking of the past in the present tense,
so the haphazardness of the narrative is intentional to represent the
haphazardness of Offred’s brain
...

Because Offred's mind longs for stimulation, she wards off the
boredom of incarceration by playing word games, twisting "Waste not
want not" into an exercise in logic: "If I am not being wasted, why
do I want?"
In an existential brain stretcher, she declares, "I am alive, I live, I
breathe, I put my hand out, unfolded, into the sunlight," yet the
warm rays fail to penetrate to the chilled soul that doubts the future
and longs for news of mother, husband, and daughter
...
"
The persistent color motif suggesting menstruation and the female
cycle resounds in the blatant scarlet color of the Handmaid's
uniform, Serena's voluptuous tulips, and the blood spots on the hoods
of executed doctors
...
"
Curiously, Offred's name suggests both "of Fred" and "off red," a
hint of her rebellion against authoritarianism
...

The ambiguity of Offred's position in Gilead is reflected in society's
unresolved conflict of interests
...

As a potential failure, she lives under a sword of Damocles, an
unnamed punishment that will fall on her after three years of failed
attempts to conceive
...
"

ANY NOTES?

CHAPTER 3
The garden

‘’tulips are opening their cups’’
‘’tulips are red, a darker crimson
towards the stem’’
‘’a light blue veil thrown’’
Angels … front line
‘’give them a sense of purpose…I
envy the Commander’s wife’’
a reproach … a necessity

This garden is the domain of the
Commander's Wife - The garden
represents a natural world of
vibrant life which the Commander's
Wife currently tries rigidly to
control
...

This suggests to us that there is a
war going on
...
Offred is a ‘necessity'
because, if it is to survive, Gilead
needs more children - but only men
in positions of power are given
fertile women as Handmaids
...

This shows the lack of self-worth
that the Handmaids have been
forced to have in Gilead as, even
though Offred is there to help the
Commander’s Wife start a family,
she is still ‘a reproach’
...

But she is doing it for the fate of
Guardian … previous posting

reproduction and the human race
...
The military term
‘posting' indicates that she was
commanded to go - she has no
choice
...

‘’we are permitted front doors but
after that were supposed to use
the back’’

We realise that this rigidly
structured society is a relatively
new state
...
Yet, the word ‘’position’’
is quite derogatory as it defined the
handmaid not as individuals but,
shows that they are recognised
through their functional prerequisite
of procreation
...

Capitalism itself has collapsedmoney and social class hierarchy are
the basis of capitalism but here
colour hierarchy through a
disenchanting of the bible and a
theocratic ruling have produced an
authoritarian society based on

‘’you’re the new one’’
‘’head lowered’’
‘’her nervous pleading smiles
...

Should we pity her here? While it is
understandable that on a certain
level, she is jealous of her inability
to reproduce and being forced to
see her husband have sex with
another woman on the same bed,
the complexity of her cruel actions
and words towards Offred presents
a woman devoid of compassion
...

Objectifying Serena- a doll is only
an object that is beautified to play
whatever roll, the owner decidesshe is also under the reign of Gilead
Violence permitted

‘’flower borders…daffodils are now facing and the tulips are opening their
cups, spilling out color’’- symbolism of growth and fertility- image of
opening and spilling something give rise to an imagery of delivery where a
baby ‘’spill out’’ from the opening of its mother

CHAPTER 4
‘’the gravel path’’

Irregular path + things placed over
weed
...

This must mean the commander is
in the house’’

The use of pathetic fallacy here
mimics Offred gloomy mood and
even characteristic
...

Moreover, the indication of natural
fertility being ‘’half dead’’ serve to
highlight the probability of death or
a soon to be ending
...

The irony here is flagrant as this
imagery suggest growth and
development of life and is an epic
imagery of a romantised array of
flora which is in total contrast with
the allegory that Atwood tries to
make us understand here
...
The
idea that they are sex objects
being dehumanized due to their
biology can be seen here
...

The quick recollection of event that
Offred demonstrate shows her
adaptation to Gilead lifestyles
...
where he seems
to stay most of the time’’
...


adapt, we see a certain attitude of
nonchalance here
...

The notion of capitalism is detected
here where the powerful owns the
wealth and the powerless holds what
Marxist Karl Marx calls ‘relations of
production’ with the elites
...
The notion of the
commander being securely and
comfortably in his room while one
Guardian washes his car highlight
this relationship based on
productivity
...

A biblical pastiche can be seen here
as the ‘’Chariot’’ and the
‘’Whirlwind’’ both refers to the
incident mentioned in 2Kings 2:11
where Elijah, sitting in a chariot,
was ascended to heaven by a
whirlwind
...
speaks of
glory
...
The notion of the
fabrication of such an ‘’expensive
car’’ being ‘’much better’’ than Elijah
triumph to heaven depict how
materialism rules over spiritualism in
this society
...

‘’It’s black, of course, the colour of The use of syndeton elongates the
prestige or a hearse and long and
line which serve to highlight the
sleek’’
prestigious degree associated with
the colour ‘’black’’
...

It associates the commander to the
highest degree
...
They
may retain more power than women
but it remains that they are
subjugated by the norms of such
society
...
While Offred is

‘’This at least hasn’t changed; the
way men caress good cars’’

‘’He’s wearing the uniform of the
Guardian, but his cap is tilted at a
jaunty angle and sleeves are rolled
to the elbow…He has a
cigarette…black market’’

‘’of Fred’- subjugated by the
commander Fred, the ‘’commander’’
Fred is subjugated by the laws of
Gilead
...
The barbarity of the
idea of men idolizing and sexualizing
objects like cars while they
demeane women and deprive them of
real sexual ‘caress’ makes the
audience bouche-bee
...
This can be considered
as an act of rebellion, no matter
how trivial it looks
...

Cigarettes has the symbolism of
escapism from reality- a means to
be intoxicated in the Tabaco fume
and thus forget life’s hardships
...
Offred is
clearly well trained in Gilead’s laws,
since she even knows a Guardian’s
uniform rules
...

He looks at me, and sees me
looking
...
28)
...
I
sign, exhaling’’
...
’ (p
...

The lexical choice issues suggest a
process of selection where the
handmaids can be seen as pure
commodity selected and then issues
as trophies to the men who have
‘high statuses
...

Gilead flaws can be seen here as
the regime cannot forcibly remove
her consciousness but they can only
try to repress her thoughts
...


‘’ He begins to whistle
...
This
makes the imagery of such a
flirtatious act much more real
...

Offred cannot afford to take an
apparently friendly if subversive
gesture at its face value
...
In Gilead, the
‘Eyes' are spies, members of the
secret service
...
' This
highlight that the authorities who
rule Gilead deify themselves by
trying to steal God’s attributes of
‘’all-seeing’’ and appropriating it to
themselves
...

Gilead has successfully created an
atmosphere of paranoia and fear so
powerful that Offred polices

herself
...

‘’ Sidewalks are kept much cleaner ‘’ Atwood highlights a dilemma: by
controlling people's reactions
through fear of reprisals,
repressive regimes clamp down on
anti-social behaviour as well as on

‘’ They also serve who only stand
and wait ‘’

liberties
...

Aunt Lydia quotes the last line of
Milton's sonnet On His Blindness,
which records the
poet's faith in God's purposes
...


‘’Some of you will fall on dry
ground, or thorns ‘’

A reference to one of the parables
of Jesus, told in Luke 8:4-15
...
Aunt
Lydia, however, is referring to
whether the Handmaids will
successfully become pregnant
...

Atwood appears to probe into
sensitive topics here as an allegory
to any fundamentalists religion
which uses the book of God as
testament for their ill-doing
...

The anthropomorphic reference od’s
a handmaid association with a ‘’tree’’
show the nonsocial notion of such
indoctrination
...
The swift changes from

‘’Think of yourselves as seeds…who
would say, Arms up in the air now;
let’s pretend we’re trees
...


imperative ‘’let’s pretend to the
submissive ‘’ pretending I am’’ show
how Offred listens to nonsensical
values and obey
...
However, the act of
‘pretending’ to be a ‘tree’ is also
mimetic of childhood behaviour, and
patience, and is furthermore a
cliché of the minor roles in school
plays: the cliché of “playing a tree”
is metaphorical for being
insignificant, and this is how the
Handmaids are made to feel
...
Here on one hand,
it suggests innocence of the mind
where the ‘’children’’-the
handmaids- need to keep purity of
thoughts to avoid developing a a
dark mentality that may bring
thoughts of rebellion
...
The

‘’A shape like mine’’ + ‘’walk
together’’ + ‘’twos’’

adjective ‘’wheedling’’ and
‘’conspirational’’ shows that the Aunt
here use linguist manipulation where
her use of language is a mechanism
of indoctrination for social order in
Gilead
Atwood integrates element of Gothic
by using the technique of ‘doubling’
as Ofglen seems to be the
doubleganger of Offred
...

Atwood has repeated the abstract
noun ‘shape’ indicates that this is
how Handmaids are seen by the
outside world
...
Had they not been taught
and manipulated to ‘pretend they’re
trees’, for example, they would not

‘’nondescript woman’’ + ‘’she is the
right one’’

‘’Blessed be the fruit’’ + ‘’May the
lord open’’

view each other as ‘shapes
...
This is emphasised by
the adjective ‘’nondescript’’
...
The phrase comes

from the ominous suffering
mentioned in Deuteronomy
28:53 but is also associated with
another biblical quotation,
from Genesis 1:28, where God
tells Adam and Eve to ‘Be fruitful
and increase in number'
...
The way that
Ofglen says ‘Blessed be the fruit’ in
this circumstance, with Offred’s
response, is a greeting to signify
their convergence, as Adam and Eve
converged with the ‘fruit’ and the
‘Lord’
...
The figurative
interpretation of the bible seems to
be the main cause of misery for the
handmaid
...


The wishful thinking from ‘’May the
Lord open’’ is emphasised through
the eulogy this phrase ignites
...

‘’ slips through the net…the other
will be accountable’’

The notion of accountability is
prevalent in the bible but here
there is a twist because one person
becomes accountable for the other’s
‘’slip’’ which contrast to the original
belief that a person is accountable
for his own sins
...
The idea of
entrapment can be seen here
...

But they will have their Handmaid

‘’The truth is that she is my spy,
as I am hers’’

companion there to help them
...

The irony here is that if the reader
flashforward themselves to chapter
8 where it is revealed that Ofglen

is actually a ‘’spy’’ from the
underground resistance, the irony
here is palpable
...

The irony is that the ‘doubling’
Gilead tries to implement through
making them a ‘pair’ is having the
opposite effect of conformity that
the regime wants as here they are
indeed a ‘double’ but one where
trust is required and mistrust
vanishes
...
Everything reminds
her of Aunt Lydia, a sign of
successful brainwashing
...

The description implies that Ofglen
is just as vulnerable and insecure as
Offred is, due to her walking
‘demurely’ with her ‘head down’
...


Ofglen

Handmaids only have identity
through the men they serve
...

Glen means a deep valley which
leaves an atmosphere of suspicion
and curiosity around her name since
the characteristic of a deep valley
is that of darkness and suspense
...


Praise be
...
They smoked
them out

The young ones are often the most
fanatical

‘’The Guardian aren’t soldiers
...
When she
does speak, much of what she says
is necessarily formulaic, to hide her
thoughts
Gilead is supposedly based
on Christian principles yet rebels
against the regime are Baptists an evangelical Christian group which
particularly stresses the importance
of adult baptism
...

Baptists generally reject the closer
organisation and control of, for
example, episcopal churches
...

How can we say that only women
are suffering?

‘’shot a woman…a Martha…she was
fumbling in her robe, for her pass,
and they thought she was hunting
for a bomb’’
‘’Doing their job (Cora)… Nothing
safer than dead, Said Rita angrily’’
‘’salute us, raising three
fingers…supposed to show respect,
because of the nature of our
services’’

Lack of care for death
...


This juxtaposes with how the
Commander and his wife, and the
Aunts and the Angels, view the
Handmaids, even though they are
doing the ‘service’ for the
Commander and his wife, and were
ordered to do it by the Aunts
...


them
...

By animalizing the Guardians through
the anthropomorphic association
with ‘’dog’’, not only does Offred
create a reversal of psychological
power where she is the one in
control but the readers also note
her desperation to cling to the idea
that her body is ‘’power’’
...
This is not reality; she can
only hope that in her perspective to

Salvaging’s or Prevaginal

allowed … to marry
...

Yet, this postmodern notion of
simulacrum is associated with a
refusal to accept reality as those
that lose grasp of their reality
means that they have lost grasp of
the power to change reality
...

Offred fantasizes about tempting
the male guards with her body
...
(Such words,
derived from two others, are known
as portmanteau words
...
(Note, however, that the
term 'salvaging' has been used in
real life in the Philippines, for
killings of suspects by the police
...
Again,
we see that women such as the

Handmaids are regarded as
property
...
' For
Offred, sexual relations are sacred
because they should involve
an exchange (a word she stresses
from chapter 1), a link with other
humans and their emotions
...
The
street is almost like a museum”- the notion of sleep here highlights the
motif of dream suggesting that such an environment is as illusionary as it is
realistic, just like when one wakes up from a dream that feels too realistic
to be passed as illusionary
...

“Gilead is within you”- synecdoche- appropriation and internalization of the
environment and laws as mean of developing identity
“Such freedom now seems weightless”- the pseudo-poundage and lack of
heaviness associated with an abstract noun freedom shows its thinness in
such society
...
However, in terms of
sexual protection women are safe but what about other physical abuse
inflicted on them by the regime such as sending them to the colonies where
they died of chemical intoxication
...

“We were a society dying…of too much choice”- the pluralism here- the
notion of death- choice seen as a dooming motif here- the alternative
found by Gilead seems to be repressiveness- is the society now not dying of
too little choice though? Killing everyone’s freedom and individuality as well
as identity and gender stability, characterizes a society that is socially
constructed on tyranny and despotism
“Oranges” as an achievement- seems far-fetched- it is the simplicity if the
object- the fruit- contrasted with the complexity of such dictatorial action
of buying oranges as a that provokes disillusionment
...
A conglomeration
of people and the declarative sentence “coming towards us” is implemented
with such an intensity that it gives the readers the impression that these
people are dangerous
...
The oxymoron
derived from “cheerfulness aggressive” sustains this idea of jeopardy where
the happiness of these tourists acts as a repressive ideological suppressant
on the mind of the handmaids
...
It is also
dangerous from a religious perspective since Offered by declaring
“staring…
...
The idea of illusion and reality- even that
past has its darkness- Offred repetitiveness to gather only the good
memories of the past fails and bow down to the negative ones
...
As long as I don’t move
...
I need to believe it
...

‘’Attaching a name attaches you to the world’’- identity
Going to see the ducks with her mom- Allusion to Catcher in the eye and
Holden canfield’s loss of innocence while watching ducks- similar to Offred
who loses her innocence in a way by seeing pornographic books being burnt
‘’flames…parts of women’s bodies, turning black ash in the air, before my
eyes’’- an image of actual burning of women’s bodies scarring image of her
childhood- Christmas analogy- destructive analogy- Christmas is supposed
to be about giving and not burning
‘’out of time’’- an end or has already come to an end- dystopia
CHAPTER 13
‘’ One of the things I wasn’t
prepared for-the amount of unfilled
time, the long parentheses of
nothing’’

The idea of nothingness is evolved
here where Offred’s life is like a
void-a nothingness in itself whereby
all the activities in her life are not
hers but condoned by the regime
...

‘’Time as a white sound’’

•

The idea of sonority or
phonetic
...
‘Time’ is also an
idea that has obtains
the pure and blank
connotations that ‘white’
does
...
80)
...
The Red Centre,
therefore, represents a
‘blank’ and unnecessary ‘time’

‘’If only I could…I want’’ +’’weave,
knit…cigarette’’

for the Handmaids
...

The idea of waning to be in serena
joy shoes can be seen here with all
of her activities being envied by
Offred
...
The notion that
women’s bodies are ‘’animationsources of entertainment- show
that they are sports of pleasure
for a culture of hypermasculinity
...
Yet, the
adjective ‘’boredom’’ show that
Offred is detached from such
sexualization, maybe even comparing
her vapid life with theirs
...
Here the idea of
anthropomorphizing handmaids to
‘’’pigs’’ that are the entertainment
of the regime to ‘’market’’ as baby
machines highlight the theme of
repression
...

‘’ I wish I had a pig ball’’
‘’The first…the second…the
third…they’d peck themselves to
death, rather than quit’’

Pg 108 – ‘’arms at the sides…expel’’

The use of numeration suggests the
technique of a ticking clock scenario
where the numbers give the
impression of a clock ticking from
one, two and then three
...
yet,
Offred is referring here to how the
law of the fittest no longer applied
in Gilead because the regime has
already appropriated themselves as
the bet survivors that have
subjugated the weak
...

The syndetic listings+ descriptive
nature of Aunt Lydia language + her
determination to make their life as
great baby machine + this Is not
for health for the handmaid to feel
good in their body, it is an exercise
of sort to increase their chance of
being baby makers
...
Atwood was a fanatic of
the women right’s movement and the
campaigns against women’s role
being domestic and motherhood
were their main controversy
...

Chapter 16:
“big-bellied sails” + “bellying” + “swollen belly”= remind her that the most
important part of her body is her belly; to bear children; aren’t these thus
metonymy for pregnancy
‘’ her legs are apart, I lie between them…supposed to signify that we are
one flesh, one being’’The notion of doubling with ofglen blurs to give to the
singular + Offred fertility is moulding into serena and serne love and
mannerism for the commander is moulding into offred; supposedly
“my skirt hitched up to my waist” + ‘’the commander is fucking’’ + ‘’not
making love’’ + ‘’copulating’’ + ‘’rape’’ + being fucked ‘’ + ‘’pleasurable,
painful’’ + ‘’ regular two marching stroke’’ + ‘’man humming ‘’ + ‘’drumming his
fingers’’ + ‘’stifled a groan’’ + ‘’expels it’’+ ‘’comes at last’’ + ‘’ the juice of
the commander runs down my legs’’ = this is ‘’serious business’’ + ‘’his duty’’=
the innuendos + vulgarity and colloquialism of fucking represents the lack of
emotion; here the hypernym is ‘’fucking’’ and the hyponym are the
delineations + very suggestive + semantic field of sexuality yet this is no
venereal act
Offred plunges into a series of negation “nothing to do with passion…nothing
to do with sexual desire…arousal and orgasm are no longer thought
necessary” + sexual pleasure considered as “outdated” = it is not a
libidinous action since there is no salacious intent
“withdraws, recedes, rezippers”- the asyndetic listings show the speed at
which the commander escapes

“which one of us is it worse, for her or me?”= one point of commonality is
suffering
Chapter 19
Paradoxical linguist as in chapter 19 when she uses oxymoronic phrases such
as "im dreaming that i am awake", "walk across the room, not this room and
go out the door, not this door" = the fact that Offred has to consistently
tell herself that this place is not the real room with the real door show
that her past, her memories and thus her conscience is better than her
reality; a form of psychological self-entrapment
...
offred says "i feel drugged…maybe theyre
drugging me
...
Sanity is a valuable
possession; i hoard it the way people hoarded money
...

‘’will it be blue and not for me’’= woman against woman
‘’locks the double doors’’= this is not for safety but pure entrapment, mean
to not let them run away or try to commit suicide
Personification of the siren ‘’he siren screams: Make way, make way’’

‘’there are tears, running down her cheeks, but tears of what? Envy,
disappointment? But no she’s laughing’’= the envy and dispointement are
actually what offred is feeling; the woman actions show her happiness
‘’on this day we can do anything we want/ I revise that: within limits’’=
theme of repression
‘’sound of death today…a baby…or something else, an Unbaby, with pinhead
or a snout like a dog’s or two bodies, a hole in its heart or no arms or
webbed hands and feet’’= creepy imagery + but this is reality + it sounds
like something familiar
‘’machines…outlawed’’= scans have been banned; technology has been
repressed as well
‘’you cant have them taken out’’= Atwwod raises question about abortion
here
Page 172= we learn about the radiation; reason why babies die quickly
Nuclear holocaust; ‘’maybe a vulture would die of eating you’’ her allusion
are quite creepy if not horrific
‘’death watch’’= again she ponder on the meaning of words; a ‘’kind of
beetle, t buries carrion’’
‘’I cant think of myself, my body sometimes without seeing the skeleton’’=
reminder that all her chance of having babies are still dead
Offred defines her as just human; someone with ‘’ bones…warped proteins’’
‘’exploding atomic power plants’’ + ‘’San Andreas’s fault’’ + ‘’mutant strain of
syphilis’’= Atwood agai n warn us of man destroying man; the ability of man
to produce over[passing technologies can have vast effects; this book may
be a fiction but a dystopia remains a warning; a possibility; a hereafter
...
We want you to be
valued girls…think yourselves as pearles’’= she almost romanticized her
words + uses flowerly language to deceive/ manipulate
‘’we are hers to define , we must suffer her adjectives’’= cliché
‘’ All of us here will lick you into shape’’= creepy imagery
‘’pregnant woman, wired up to a machine, electrodes coming out of her…like
a broken robot…man with a searchlight looking up between her
legs…beardless girl…sterilized knives…cooperative patient…drugged
women…cut them open, sewed them up…No anaesthetic even’’= they even
sustain such torture-like delivery with biblical sustantation
‘’little whores, al of them…they aren’t even clean…wont give you a smile,
mope in their room…have to bribe her…threaten her…stern measures’’=

By delineating the handmaid as ‘’little whores’’, the wives vituperate them
...
They demonize them even though
it is the handmaid that have to be rape, give birth then give away her child
to another woman
...
Clearly, the obloquy
of Janine crates pathos
...

The illiberality of their words and actions introduces the wives as gender
puritanist
‘’bitch janine’’- Offred rudimentary, if not ghetto type of language show
her inconsideration towards Janine situation
...
In fact,
Offred chastisement and caviling of Janine mimic the wives vicious bullying,
the same people she hates with a passion
...
Clearly, the lambast of
Offred is a form of insularity towards her own cult of fertility- the
handmaids- who is being marginalize just like her
...

they look at each other through the window with “the same kind of hunger”
(201) as star-crossed Shakespearean lovers
it is not possible to say with certainty how he truly feels
...
When he first enters Offred’s room and tells her, “It’s
all right
...
Go with them” (305), Offred thinks that he may be
an Eye and the “escape” may be a trap
...
His own fate remains unknown
Offred & the commander
‘Was he invading? Was he in my room? / I called it mine
...
59)
...
The Commander may have had this dominance over
Offred and made her become attached to her room, and it is now a
permanent place for her to stay
...
It is unclear whether he
genuinely believes that “we’ve given [women] more than we’ve taken away”

(231) or is simply unconcerned with women’s suffering
...

When the Commander is “fucking […] the lower part of [Offred’s] body”
(104), he is engaging in a perfunctory act that “has nothing to do with
sexual desire” (105) and is, again, marked by indifference and unawareness
...
His attitude changes from one of indifference to one of patronizing,
patriarchal fondness, as though Offred changes from an object to a pet or
a precocious child to be humored and entertained but never treated as
anything approaching an equal
...
Such delusion, denial, and unawareness are also present
when he takes Offred to Jezebel’s, a brothel for high-ranking men, and
appears to think that she will genuinely enjoy having sex with him, as
though he does not see that the power structures that fundamentally shape
his relationship with Offred mean there can never be anything truly mutual
or consensual between them
...


Textual analysis of chapter 19 (FULLY-WRITTEN ESSAY)
Discuss the effects of the writing in the following passage, considering in
what ways Atwood presents the Wives, here and elsewhere in the novel
...
As Christopher Jones highlight, “she
delegates a ‘what if scenario’ where instead of the déjà vu scene of men
abusing women, the readers witness the pejorative criticism subjected to
the handmaids by the wives
...
Clearly, the purpose of this scene is to
enhance the characterization of the wives
...

Immediately, the readers come face to face with a leitmotif structure with
the repetition of the word ‘’Guardian’’
...
In fact, the delineation of them possessing
‘’snubby machine guns’’ is symbolical
...
This depicts that Gilead is a
society bound on becoming an agency that institutionalize social control by
passing on the ideology of repressiveness through visual realities like a
Guardian casually holding a gun
...
Undoubtedly, Offred’s obssessiveness with detail
show her Gilead success in creating a populace bound by fear which
ultimately shuns out acts of rebellion
...

Furthermore, Offred highlights that men such as doctors are outside the
birthing hall engaging in ‘’some masculine pursuit’’ because ‘’they aren’t
needed at all’’ whereas all the women including wives and handmaids are
inside engaging with the birthing ceremony; a supposedly feminine role
...
This puritan ideology is
exactly what Serena Joy had preached in ‘’the time before’’ when she was a
televangelist
...


The use of polyptoton when she varies words like ‘’shame’’ and ‘’shameless’
sustain this analysis
...

Without a doubt, through this colonization of anti-feminist views by both
the Aunts and the Wives, Atwood wants to criticize the separationist
feminist of her époque who thought that excluding men from women circle
would bring justice and equality
...
To sustain, Atwood interchange the hyper-patriarchy and
toxic hegemonic masculinity that usually subjugates women with a hypermatriarchy where the Wives create a culture of toxic hegemonic femininity
through their gothic actions towards the handmaids
...
Such opprobrium is certainly a form of vilification
...
Moreover, the Wives even indulge in embarrassing
anecdotes concerning their handmaids by boldly gossiping that ‘’they aren’t
even clean…they smell…have to bribe her…threaten her…to take a bath’’
...

Though, the Wives are also hypocritical women
...
According to
Calvancanti, these women belong to a ‘’humbug subculture’’; one where
falsehood and pretense is key to their success
...

Atwood here uses the literary device meiosis- where words are used to
lessen the value of something
...
Certainly such obloquy evokes pathos
among the readers
...
The readers also note that the
jealousy that other Wives are feeling towards Ofwarren’s wife is dripping
like venom
...
Here, Atwood challenges

one main the social myth surrounding femininity: that women are inherently
kinder and gentler than men
...
Her rudimentary, if not ghetto type of language
show her inconsideration towards another fellow handmaid situation
...
In fact, Offred chastisement and caviling of Janine mimic
the Wives obloquy, the same people she hates with a passion
...
The obscene
linguist used by Offred makes the readers notice that she does not
emphasize with Janine even though she, was herself a mother once
...

Offred, unlike Moira, does not fit the role of a feminist hero and Atwood
specifically chooses a protagonist like that to showcase the willingness of
women to not empathies with their own sex
...
She
uses hyponyms of torture where a ‘’pregnant woman’’ is ‘’wired up to a
machine, electrodes coming out of her’’ along with ‘’sterilized knives’’ which
are used to ‘’cut ‘’ her, then ‘’sew’’ her back but without ‘’anesthetic’’
...
In fact, Aunt
Elizabeth justifies such horror by sensationalizing the bible
...
The fact that it is God who put
the punishment on Eve and the Aunts are trying to do the same to the
Handmaids, show that they are trying to ‘play God’
...

Finally, Atwood creates a paradox in this extract
...
The author wants us readers to ponder on whose violence is

worst: the one where men abuses women or where women? This story may
be a utopia for us, one approaching speculative fiction that is full of
symbolic violence but if the readers self-internalize themselves in the shoes
of Offred and considering our present days inequalities that also figures
women being tortured by men, women being abused by other women and
religious fundamentalism on the increase, the readers shudder in dread that
such right wing dictatorship bound on repression may not be a matter of
‘’if’’ but ‘’when’’
...

In conclusion, the ultimate result of the micro-stratification in Gilead is
the evolution of new type of misogyny, not as we usually think of it, as
men’s hatred for women but as women’s hatred for women
...
This
theocracy relies not only on patriarchy at the societal level but matriarchy
at the personal level to regulate both the social standard and social actions
of women
...
she
delegates a ‘what if scenario’ where instead of the déjà vu scene of men
abusing women, the readers witness the pejorative treatment of lower-class
women known as Handmaids being tyrannise and subjugated by upper-class
women known as Aunts
...
They propound
their status in Gilead as women capable of ruling but only remain in such
elitist position by using the Handmaids as ‘slavers of production’
...

Because men like Nick do not have Aunts that indoctrinate them, they have
been less hypnotised to follow the principles of a totalitarian regime and
thus they are more daring to challenge the regime and rebel
...
Offred on the other hand, everytime she gets the will and a bit of
courage to do something daring, every time she tries to exercise a bit of
individuality, her conscience reprimand her, she is trapped in the echochamaber of her mind, leading to a film-like Flashback of Aunt Lydia’s
warnings: “…”, “…
...

Many critics tend to be sexist
...
Then this
means that the traditionalism of gender roles advocated by the Aunts
whereby women need to stay at home and conceive but men need to go out
of the house and bring money have a Frisby effect: along with the
Handmaids, the Eco-wives and the Martha, they have also been subjugated
...
Offred is the one raking his body up and
down, thinking of “how he might smell” in desperation from the lack of
sexual intimacy
...
Atwood here gives a semi-fictional imagery of
homosexuality- one where Nick is sodomized by a masculated Offred
...
Therefore, she
reverses the sexual domination perspective and challenges patriarchy by
adopting a man’s attitude towards Nick
...
She can only have
the upper hand over the Handmaids which also mean that the Aunts
individuality gets crushed down by the indoctrinating role and followship of
totalitarianism
...
Because they are old and
infertile, the Aunts take out their frustration of being useless females for
male consumption on the Handmaids
...
Though,
the regime seems to fail categorically in doing so
...
Through her sexual relationship
with Nick, Offred can reclaim some of her identity as a sexual being and
have sex for pleasure, instead of being a life-recreation of Bilhah that
have sex with Jacob (Commander) while lying between the legs of Rachel
(Serena Joy)
...

The Aunts are not all powerful
...
Moira is a
real heroine who “dismantle the inside of a toilet” and used the “lever” to
threaten Aunt Elizabeth, who she also tied up and left in the incinerator so
as to escape
...
In the novel, the Commander reflects such
stereotype: he is seen as powerful and dominant
...
This begs the question: how does Atwood presets the
commander in the Handmaid tale?
When Offred first describe the commander, she uses harmless adjectives
like “a semi-retired man” with “silver hair”
...
This is intentionally done to make
him appear as a sympathetic character
...
As a matter of
fact, Offred constant infantilisation of the commander by using child-like
references such as “silly”, “juvenile”, “child” portrays the latter as an
innocent, vulnerable, unthreatening person easily influenced by the external
stimuli around him
...
However, it also seems
unreasonable to not condemn a man that has helped in designing and
establishing such authoritarian, militaristic regime
...
No matter how much he tries to
distance himself from the oppressive environment he has created, he is
complicit of fanatism and obscurantism
...
This juxtaposition between the Commander’s duplicitous
identities shows how appearances are deceptive: the evil oppressors are
often deceptively benevolent
...

Atwood presents the commander as a symbol of power
...
The effect emphasizes a double entendre: his power within the
house as the head is meant to also represent the power he also has in the
society around him
...
With such structural power, the
commander can easily break the rules without a set of repercussions
...

Here, Atwood present the power dynamic between men and women
...
Similarly, unlike the commander, Offred needs t be
cautious when rebelling alongside him to prevent being sent to the colonies
to die to intoxication or worst be hanged on the wall
...
He uses
strategic and mathematic language when he tells Offred proudly that
“women can’t add” because they are “the problem”
...
Here women are
metaphorised as eggs which are broken and consumed to create a better
life for the patriarchal ruling class
...
On the other hand, readers
taking a Marxist perspective would interpret such marginalisation of women
by the ruling-class as a form of ideological control to ensure that men like
the commander who are the capitalists always remain in power
...
Not only does she anthropomorphize the commander’s as a
monster possessing a lustrous body but she also dismembered his private
part (penis) with the “tentacle, his delicate stalked slug’s eye, which
extrudes, expands, winces and shrivels back”
...
Atwood therefore uses the commander as a

symbol of oppression in Offred’s life to such an extent that she chooses to
perverse the reality around her
...
When Offred sees him in front of
her room she asks herself “was he invading?” The commander has violated
her boundaries and she feels threaten by it
...
There is clearly as Offred herself
says “no doubt about who holds the real power”
...
It seems that even if the
Commander has agreed to the requests of Offred by giving her forbidden
things like lotions, magazines for her to entertain herself, the Commander
never had any intention to let this master-slave relationship ends
...
Moreover, when Offred ask the meaning of “Nolite te
bastards carborundorum”, the commander tells her it means “Don’t let the
Bastards grind you down”
...
The
Commander is clearly a symbol of misery for the people around him
...

In the pornographic, rape “ceremony” of a ménage a trois or as critics have
blaphematically referred to as the “Holy trinity sex” , the readers witness
the disturbing image of Offred lying between the legs of the Commander’s
wife with the Commander “fucking the lower part of [Offred] body”
...
This view is actually
acknowledged by Offred herself who states that “The commander, too, is
doing his duty”
...
This is objectification is summed up by Catherine
MacKinnon: “man fucks woman; subject, verb, object”
...
When Atwood

presents one of the wives referring to Janine as being like a “daughter” in
the house, the author is generalizing the handmaids as being like daughters
in the household
...

It is ironical that the Commander brings Offred to Jezebel- a brother that
subject women to the same sexual violence so common in the “time before”
...
In fact at the brother, he gives Offred a lesson in
how rostitution resulted in that “sex was too easy, anyone could buy it”
...

Consequently, the Commander here unavoidably insults the Gilead he
participated in creating by claiming that these women prefer a life in a
brother to a life in the ‘real’ Gilead
...
His character flaw
was his hubris which ultimately became his death trap; as Professor Piexoto
notes he was executed for his “liberal tendencies”
...

Here, Atwood give the possible frightening consequences of too much
egocentrism; she is warning the patriarchs of society to be careful of their
actions
...
It should be noted
that Atwood was never a separationist feminist that believe in condemning
the male sex entirely
...
For example, contrary to her sexual encounters
with the Commander, Nick allows Offred to escape her one-dimensional role
as a Handmaid and allows her to reclaim some of her identity as a sexual
being through having sex for pleasure
...
This story may be a dystopia for us, one approaching
speculative fiction that is full of symbolic violence but if the readers selfinternalize themselves in the shoes of Offred and considering our present
day inequalities that also figures manipulative, dominant men like the
commander trying to subjugate women, the readers shudder in dread that
such right wing dictatorship bound on repression may not be a matter of
“if” but “when”
...


Messages, stories, and storytelling appear throughout the novel
...
In fact, with
more stories and memories than current-time actions, the text is
profoundly repetitive
...
Atwood
uses such cyclical structure to make Offred and her readers realize the
importance of memories
...
Once women no longer remember their past lives, they
will no longer rebel because Gilead inhumane doctrine will be seen as normal
...
for the one who come after you it will be
easier…she did not say: Because they will have no memories”
...
Atwood even personifies her stories as being “limping and
mutilated”
...
So, the readers here take on a psychoanalytical perspective,
noting that Offred prefer getting beaten up mentally through the
recounting of the painful memories rather than passively letting herself be
brainwashed into becoming part of a homogenous cult of fertility- the
Handmaids
...
Indeed,
Offred induces her mind to relapse into creative imaginings whenever she is
on the verge of giving hope
...
She pictures Moira as a real heroine having
“dismantle the inside of a toilet” and uses the “lever” to threaten Aunt
Elizabeth and escape
...
Here, Offred seems to lose herself in this story
because Moira’s successful escape gives her hope that even individuals seen
as mere “womb” can jeopardize the power dynamic of Gilead
...
Moira”
...
This is
also exactly why Gilead prohibits any friendship or sisterhood
...

Such enmity when Offred tells the story of the first time she met Serena
Joy
...
Atwood through the theme of storytelling depicts one new form of
oppression: gynocentric misogyny
...
Atwood
here denounces matriarchy as ironically being a force suppressing and
oppressing women
...
This would have been approved by both
Offred’s mother and Moira as they saw these places as objectifying women
...
Through Offred storytelling Atwood concerns
about feminism is laid + a contrast between the past and the present =
Aunt Lydia quote about freedom to and freedom from + the readers

question themselves are women safer in Gilead? However = they are more
oppressed than safe + storytelling used to denounce Gilead’s oppression =
example of Janine being gang raped & gender treachery= the hanged men
on the wall
v/s every time Offred recount a story of er mother she is always
associated with feminism – a woman cave only + “I don’t want men around,
what use are they” + Atwood is against separationist feminist + she does
not condemn an entire sex + this is backlash of second wave feminism that
she is trying to rectify + Previous Offred and idiom” don’t let the bastards
grind you down” +
She uses language of the past + However, this is subjugated by the
discourse indoctrinated by Gilead= scrabble = uses language that reflect
her reproductive function
Luke= passport + possible betrayal = her daughter
Flashback is used as a device to propel storytelling
...
Certain critics argue
that Atwood should have used th third person narrative with another person
recalling Offred’s life in Gilead
...
Memories tend to be diluted and fragmented
...
This
argument can be seen when Pieixoto in the historical notes faults Offred
personal story for having “gaps” that “remain” in her narration
...
In trying to please us, she re-constructs her
first sexual intimacy with Nick two times
...
Because Offred felt
embarrassed to tell the readers about the weird noise she made when she
had sex with Nick, she openly lied about her social realities
...

However/ Yet, through the Historical notes which is a third-person
interpretation and re-construction of Offred tape recordings show the
fatality of letting someone else reconstructs her story + Pieixoto being bias
and sexist + By using a first-person narrative the readers can selfinternalize themselves in the shoes of Offred + we need to understand that
Offred came from a world much like ours: that she also used to live in a
normal country
...
This story may be a dystopia for us, one
approaching speculative fiction that is full of symbolic violence but if the
readers self-internalize themselves in the shoes of Offred and considering
our present day inequalities that also figures women being objectified and
dehumanized, religious fundamentalists inducing intolerance, the readers
shudder in dread that such right wing dictatorship bound on repression may
not be a matter of “if” but “when”
...


Offred’s affair with Nick is a significant development in her story
...

One ponders on why Offred takes endless time in delineating Nick’s room to
us
...
Yet, this
is done intentionally by Atwood
...

Atwood takes a Marxist perspective here, criticizing capitalism whereby the
powerful-ruling class symbolized by the Commander owns the wealth and the
powerless working-class like Nick sell their labour power, becoming the
‘slavers of production’ but without benefitting such from it
...
This ideology of capitalism is maintained through the
normalization of bias stereotype –whereas the Commanders is seen as
deserving the power and prestige because they have helped build Gilead, a
little man like Nick who is not “servile enough” is not worth being an elite
...
The lexical choice “issued” suggests
that the handmaids are een as commodity and prizes that only “deserving”
men enjoyed and quite curiously Nick is not one of them
...

Nick lack of conformity in the regime is a breath of fresh air because
unlike Offred who is always afraid of breaking the rules, Nick is daring
...

Actually, the readers can even attest that Nick mirror more Moira than
Offred- being an audacious, courageous and bold woman
...
No matter how simplistic
the cap and the cigarette are as objects, they are seen by the readers as
powerful symbol of rebellion considering that he lives in an authoritarian,

militaristic regime
...
Yet, despite how hero-like he seems here even by doings
things a modern reader would consider trivial and mundane, the “cigarette”
acts as a form of escapism from the harsh reality of Gilead
...
Here, Atwood depicts the fatality of human nature- in dire
circumstances, human need to rely on an external source of stimuli that
acts as coping mechanism
...
Hence, to what extent can
we really condemn Offred liberal attitude when she uses sex with the
Commander and Nick to relieve the stress of daily life? It is simply a form
of existential apologia- a mere “exchange” for the survival of an
endangered woman
...
Many critics have argued
that his unassuming character mimics that of the Commander who is
depicted as a “juvenile” and “silly” man
...
For instance, the Commander’s duplicitous identity is
vehemently rebuked by Offred: “is there no end to his disguise of
benevolence?”Atwood here seems to be comparing the Commander to the
Preident Ronld Reagan who always appeared as a polite representative but
used religious fundamentalist and conservative movements to obstruct
women’s liberties
...
Maybe she is even allegorizing the qualities she expects a a
true President to have through the characterization of Nick
...
In a society where the abuse the regime subject its population
is based on the excuse of underpopulation, the commander who is steriledespite it being illegal to be recognize as such- appears as an emasculated
man in front of Nick who can reproduce and contribute to saving his country
from the doom of extinction
...
Moreover, many critics tend to

be sexist when reading the novel
...
Yet, Georgia
Plasma argues that if Offred has been able to record the tapes of Gilead
and share it with us today, it would potentially be because of Nick
functioning as a fairy-tale prince, setting the princess free
...

It is interesting that Aunt Lydia once warned Offred about the importance
of modesty with the colloquially crude language “to be seen…is to be
penetrated”
...
Offred is the one raking his body up and don,
thinking of “how he might smell” in desperation from the lack of sexual
intimacy
...
Atwood here gives a semi-fictional imagery of homosexuality- one
where Nick is sodomized by a masculated Offred
...
While Offred
receives Nick’s sperm and the hope of conceiving and thus being saved from
going to the colonies, Nick only receives some sexual pleasure but will
remain trapped within this household
...
Therefore, she
reverses the sexual domination perspective and challenges patriarchy by
adopting a man’s attitude towards Nick
...
Her life becomes more bearable and enviable
...

Moreover, gender-bending and continual sexual intimacy highlights that
Gilead attempts at suppressing the sexuality of the Handmaids is a futile
attempt
...
When Offred describes
her first sexual intercourse with Nick to be an “assignment” this mimics
Offred description of the rape-like ceremony with the Commander as being
a “duty”
...
Though, the regime seems to fail categorically
in doing so
...

Through her sexual relationship with Nick, Offred is able to reclaim some
of her identity as a sexual being and have sex for pleasure, instead of
being a life-recreation of Bilhah that have sex with Jacob (Commander)
while lying between the legs of Rachel (Serena Joy)
...
This is
sustained when Offred tells Nick her name- the most important aspect of
both Offred’s individuality and identity
...
Despite feeling she has betrayed her old lover; Offred
cannot bring herself to fully regret her action
...

Yet, Offred’s resistance and escape are also problematic at the political
level
...
She
feels ashamed of herself when she finally “resigns [her] body freely, to be
used by others”
...
This raises the
question if love truly is a life-saver when it makes one its prisoner
...
Love makes Offred falls prey to
one of the seven deadly sins: jealousy
...
Through Nick however, we learn that
Offred is not a reliable narrator
...
Therefore the readers are
warned not to take Offred story at face value
...


POSSIBLE QUESTIONS:
Sexuality
2
...
” In what ways is
she a more complex and problematic protagonist, and how might this affect
the reader’s response to the novel?
To what extent is Offred a feminist + to what extent does she rebel + is
Offred a heroine in the novel
1
...
: Offred refuses to call her room ‘’my’’

3
...
Why is this symbolically significant? + Symbolism in the
novel
Symbolism
1
...
: her room= form of individuality +

4
...
Why
are they considered important, and how is this significance highlighted in
the text?
Storytelling
1
...
: (the present) refuses to call her room ‘’my’’ +

5
...
To what extent can they be said to be complicit in their own
oppression, and the oppression of other women?
To what extent does the women rebel
1
...
How does Gilead use language to further its control over the population
and justify its oppressive activities?
Use of Language
1
...
After Offred begins visiting the Commander in his study, she observes
that “to him I’m no longer merely a usable body” (172)
...


8
...
In what ways does this affect Offred’s perception of herself
and her body?
Reproduction
1
...
The Handmaid’s Tale is sometimes criticized for being anti-religion
...


10
...
In
what ways is it an act of rebellion against Gilead, and in what ways does it
leads to further complacency and compliance?
Nick and Offred
1
...
Explain the relationship between Offred and Moira
Moira and Offred
1
...
The importance of the Aunts
The Aunts
1
...
The importance of individuality? Offred’s character?
Offred character
1
...
: Offred refuses to call her room ‘’my’’

15
...
: They tell each other their names + Offred visit memories and
recounts events that go against the regime notion of ‘’normalcy’’ +
Girl’s fashion However, the H tells each other their names
2
...
The importance of the Historical notes?
Historical notes



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