Essay Romantic Love in Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale

In a society where women are completely oppressed they have two choices: To conform and survive, or to rebel and risk execution. Conformity would entail suppressing their morals and their personal rights to adapt to Gilead’s social standards. Would one choose self-inflicted isolation by disassociating oneself as a human being to survive, or gain more rights and disregard all morals by working for the government? This society is represented in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaids Tale. The novel is set in the Republic of Gilead, a dictatorship, formerly known as the United States of America. The government controls all aspects of the lives’ of its citizens, with its harshest regulations directly affecting women.

From the outset of 'The Handmaids Tale' the reader is placed in an unknown world, where the rights and freedom of women have been taken away. We follow the narrative journey of a handmaid, named Offred.

The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood describes the story of Offred, a Handmaid, that is a woman ascribed a breeding function by society, and who is placed with a husband and wife higher up the social ladder who need a child. Through Offred's eyes we explore the rigidity of the theocracy in which she lives, the contradictions in the society they have created, and her attempts to find solace through otherwise trivial things. The heroine is never identified except as Offred, the property of her current Commander, she was a modern woman: college-educated, a wife and a mother when she lost all that due to the change in her society. The novel can be viewed from one perspective as being a feminist depiction of the suppression of a woman, from another

In Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, Offred recounts the story of her life and that of others in Gilead, but she does not do so alone. The symbolic meanings found in the dress code of the women, the names/titles of characters, the absence of the mirror, and the smell and hunger imagery aid her in telling of the repugnant conditions in the Republic of Gilead. The symbols speak with a voice of their own and in decibels louder than Offred can ever dare to use. They convey the social structure of Gileadean society and carry the theme of the individual's loss of identity.

depending on the reader, but he uses his power to get what he wants. ,

It is necessary for the government to impose a certain amount of power and control of its citizens in order for a society to function properly. However, too much power and control in a society eliminates the freedom of the residents, forbidding them to live an ordinary life. In the dystopian futuristic novel, The Handmaids Tale, Margaret Atwood demonstrates the theme of power and control through an oppressive society called the Republic of Gilead. The government established power and control through the use of the wall, military control, the salvaging, the particicution, and gender.

“The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood is a story set in an alternate future in which birth rates have plummeted immensely. In the Republic of Gilead, they seem to have found a solution for this decline in birth rates: handmaids. Handmaids are women who are fertile. They go to houses of wealthy and powerful couples who cannot bear children and have sexual intercourse with the male of the house (also known as the Commander). The problem with this solution is that it is forcing women, such as our narrator Offred, to have sex. When Offred and the Commander have sex, it is during a ritual called the Ceremony. Other than the Ceremony, sex is forbidden. Although, there are still some situations in which it occurs. For instance, at Jezebels, a

A woman’s power and privileges depend on which societal class she is in. In Margaret Atwood’s novel The Handmaid’s Tale each group of women are each represented in a different way. The three classes of women from the novel are the Handmaids, the Marthas and the Wives. The ways in which the women are portrayed reflect their societal power and their privileges that they bestow.

Desire is a powerful and dangerous emotion which has the ability to overtake and disregards any rational state of mind, creating disorder and life-threatening consequences, thus making it feared as a form of disorder or misdirected imagination. However, desire cannot exist without a lack of satisfaction, allowing the once forbidden to become desirable. These illicit desires which are in conflict with social laws and norms are often repressed into the unconscious. Emerging in forms which are disguised so that they may be unrecognisable to the conscious mind due to the dangerous, forces and consequences they present. Such desires can be identified in George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) which mirrors post-war social and political issues, portraying the devastation, destruction and control on the outer limits of humanity in a dystopian world. In a world where thought, history and relationships are manipulated and governed, romantic and autonomies desire become a means of rebellion in order to maintain sanity, truth, and an objective reality as a means of resistance against the governing party. Margaret Atwood’s novel The Handmaid’s Tale (1985) is a speculative fiction which explores the need for a sustained political, feminist consciousness and activity among woman by exploring the political and social consequence of their absence. In The Handmaid’s Tale, we see illicit desire through the use of language and literature in a dystopian world which governs class

Offred's memories are a way for her to escape a society riddled with hopelessness. The authoritarian society of Gilead prevents her from

Her belief gives her a false sense of security as well as her unwillingness to rebel due to fear of the Eyes. Her conversations with others are "Praise be," "Blessed be the fruit," and "May the Lord open" it is difficult for Offred or any women to really have a meaningful conversation for fear that anyone is a spy. Everything that Offred does is now part of the norm of society. She doesn't question her duties just does what is expected of her. As Offred begins a secret relationship with Nick she believes she has reclaimed a tiny piece of her past. She becomes addicted to the small amount of companionship from Nick, causing her to turn a blind eye to the injustices going on around her. She feels empowered because it was her own choice. When in reality she did what was expected of her. Using her body in order to produce a child.

Psychological criticism has roots as far back as the fourth century BC, when Aristotle “commented on the effects of tragedy on an audience, saying hat by evoking pity and fear, tragedy creates a cathartic of those emotions” (Dobie 54). More recently, however, psychological criticism has been shaped and influenced by the work of Sigmund Freud. He developed theories concerning “the workings of the human psyche, its formations, its organization, and its maladies” that, while further refined by other theorists, are still the basis of the modern approach to literary criticism (Dobie 54). Freud’s theory of the tripartite psyche is used to classify and define the conscious and unconscious mind into the id, ego, and superego. When examined using this theory, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, a dystopian novel about a patriarchal totalitarian government that has replaced the United States of America, is particularly interesting.

“I feel thankful to her. She has died that I may live. I will mourn later” (Atwood 286). Many sacrifices and hard decisions are made by unorthodox people to keep what they believe in alive. There would be no rebellions and no change without these nonconforming people. Offred, the main character and a Handmaiden, would have faced eminent death in her strictly orthodox world had it not been for the rebelliousness of those who died before her wanting change. The Republic of Gilead, previously known as the United States, is a theocracy. Environmental events and population decline prompt changes. A caste system is created, and each caste performs specific duties. They are punished if the laws are not followed. The Eyes are at the top of the caste system; they make sure the laws are obeyed. Next are the Commanders and their Wives. The Handmaiden’s main task is to produce a child with their Commander. In Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, some unorthodox characters challenge the theocracy such as Offred, Ofglen, and Nick.

Unlike Moira, Offred is desperate to conceive the Commanderís child in order to survive. Both women parallel many women in todayís society. On one hand, there are feminists who rebel against society no matter what it costs. On the other hand, there are women who are just trying to survive and find their place in a society in which they are second class citizens. In the novel, Offred is torn between smearing her face with butter to keep her complexion and hanging herself. In the same manner, she is caught between accepting the status of women under the new regime and following her own desires to gain knowledge and fall in love. Offred doesnít know whether to accept the circumstances and die inside, or to fulfill her own desires, set herself free like Moira has done. The contrast between Moira and Offred reveals Atwoodís attitude towards women and their sometimes self-destructive submission. Atwood shows the oppression of women through the extreme setting of the story, but she also allows the reader to see how women passively oppress themselves.

reader can infer from Offred’s monologues that she, to some extent, wants to be a