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The Handmaid's Tale Passage Analysis

Decent Essays

In Oryx and Crake, the flashbacks of Jimmy’s friendship with Crake throughout many years, and the actions that lead to his eventual involvement in Crake’s sinister plans for mankind, are essential to understanding the surroundings Snowman finds himself in. Through flashbacks we learn about the structure of the society: large corporations own Compounds, fenced off areas that resemble small towns, where employees and their families can live safely. Outside these safe Compounds is the city, known as “the pleeblands” (33), where public safety is not ensured, and life is generally more dangerous and unpredictable. A fatigued Snowman fills his days with recollections of what his life was like with Crake, both before Crake’s goal was to recreate …show more content…

For example, when out running errands, Offred runs into a group of Japanese tourists. The women of this group, it is revealed, do not follow the same strict rules set by their government as do the women found in Gilead. Offred notices that the women are exposed in all their “darkness and sexuality” (32), and that “they seem undressed” (32), as she has become indoctrinated her society to question the provocative behaviour of women, and believe that what Gilead has done has been to keep women safe. This can come as a surprise, in that it establishes that only in Gilead—possibly in only what is known as North America— are the harsh rules on how women should behave present, suggesting that the crisis of dropping fertility rates is not worldwide. This in turn raises the question of the isolation of Gilead from the rest of the world, apparently enough so that Offred is surprised by the appearance of the Japanese women. This isolation from the rest of the world adds to the dystopian feel of the novel, in the sense that although the rest of the world is not in ruin, and Gilead is not the only remaining area of habitation for humans, the isolation creates a very discernible boundary separating the actions and behaviour of Gilead, from that of the rest of the

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