The Handmaid's Tale Sparknotes

Offred, in Margaret Atwood’s disturbing novel The Handmaid’s Tale says, “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.” The society of Gilead causes the aforementioned pain and demoralization by using women’s bodies as political instruments. Similar to Atwood’s novel, today’s men put immense pressure on women to be a certain way, give them children, and take care of the home and the like. In Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, she examines the theme of demoralization of women through graphic predictions of what women’s futures may look like.

Serena Joy is the most powerful female presence in the hierarchy of Gileadean women; she is the central character in the dystopian novel, signifying the foundation for the Gileadean regime. Atwood uses Serena Joy as a symbol for the present dystopian society, justifying why the society of Gilead arose and how its oppression had infiltrated the lives of unsuspecting people.

In Margaret Atwood’s ‘The Handmaids Tale’, we hear a transcribed account of one womans posting ‘Offred’ in the Republic of Gilead. A society based around Biblical philosophies as a way to validate inhumane state practises. In a society of declining birth rates, fertile women are chosen to become Handmaids, walking incubators, whose role in life is to reproduce for barren wives of commanders. Older women, gay men, and barren Handmaids are sent to the colonies to clean toxic waste.

The Handmaid's Tale, a film based on Margaret Atwood’s book depicts a dystopia, where pollution and radiation have rendered innumerable women sterile, and the birthrates of North America have plummeted to dangerously low levels. To make matters worse, the nation’s plummeting birth rates are blamed on its women. The United States, now renamed the Republic of Gilead, retains power the use of piousness, purges, and violence. A Puritan theocracy, the Republic of Gilead, with its religious trappings and rigid class, gender, and racial castes is built around the singular desire to control reproduction. Despite this, the republic is inhabited by characters who would not seem out of place in today's society. They plant flowers in the yard, live in suburban houses, drink whiskey in the den and follow a far off a war on the television. The film leaves the conditions of the war and the society vague, but this is not a political tale, like Fahrenheit 451, but rather a feminist one. As such, the film, isolates, exaggerates and dramatizes the systems in which women are the 'handmaidens' of today's society in general and men in particular.

Paula Hawkins, a well-known British author, once said, “I have lost control over everything, even the places in my head.” In Margaret Atwood’s futuristic dystopia The Handmaid’s Tale, a woman named Offred feels she is losing control over everything in her life. Offred lives in the Republic of Gilead. A group of fundamentalists create the Republic of Gilead after they murder the President of the United States and members of Congress. The fundamentalists use the power to their advantage and restrict women’s freedom. As a result, each woman is assigned a specific duty to perform in society. Offred’s husband and child are taken away from her and she is now forced to live her life as a Handmaid. Offred’s role in society is to produce a child

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood is set in a future time period where the United States is under the control of the Gileadean regime. A terrorist attack leads to the collapse of Congress, the suspension of the Constitution, and the establishment of a theocratic totalitarian government. Men and women are given roles within society; they are Commanders, Eyes, Handmaids, and Marthas. In this novel, Atwood explores a prominent social issue, feminism. The suppression and power of women are examined through the setting and characterization of the novel to help understand the meaning of the novel as a whole.

Can human live without love? The answer is evidently no. Love can be defined as: the most spectacular, indescribable, deep euphoric feeling for someone. Margaret Atwood, the author of the outstanding dystopian fiction the handmaid 's tale (1985) had once in her book said: " nobody dies from lack of sex. It 's lack of love we die from.” In this novel, Atwood specifically depicts a society where relationships have been altered, undermined and in many ways forbidden. The key word in the issue of relationships is love. In the Republic of Gilead, a form of theocratic government, women had lost their ability to love. The protagonist Offred is a handmaid whose sole purpose in life is to reproduce a child. Gilead expects its handmaids to have faith in its commandments, but has removed love and hope from them. Women became objects and sex slaves to men. Therefore, the relationships of the protagonist Offred are unhealthy as well as abnormal, yet they are source of hope for Offred to survive from this theocratic form of government. Her relationship with the commander is strained but profitable, her relationship with Serena Joy has lots of tensions and conflicts; and her relationship with Nick is subtle as well as controversial.

Form, Structure and Plot: The novel has 15 parts, 46 chapters, and 378 pages. The novel has a series of flashbacks and dream sequences that take the reader from Offred’s life in the present and her past life with Luke (her husband) and her daughter. The story is hard to follow because you do not always know what will trigger her flashbacks. The novel only covers about two years in the present, but the flashbacks cover the year leading to the present, and the historical notes jumps to 2195.

Chapter 2: When Prim’s name is called, Katniss is shocked. it’s literally her worst nightmare come true. However, her love for Prim allows her to summon the strength to come back to her senses .Katniss’s love for Prim gives her the strength to volunteer for what most would consider to be a death sentence. In a district where more people are struggling and looking out for their own survival, this kind of sacrifice makes a huge impression, and suddenly thrusting Katniss forward as an example of the way that people can be united by loyalty and love despite the Capitol's efforts to divide. Peeta’s mother has no sympathy for beggars, showing that she doesn’t understand the plight of those who have less than she does. Peeta receives a punishment

Wool begins with the character of Holston; he is the sheriff of a safe haven underground a silo. Three years before the events in the book, Holston’s wife Allison broke one of the worst laws in the silo she had proclaimed she wanted to go outside. She was exiled from the silo with the expectation that she would die. The atmosphere is toxic and because of this, people are sent outside wearing suits that only last for a limited period of time. Then the suits degrade, and the wearer is killed by the toxic atmosphere.

In today’s news we see many disruptions and inconsistencies in society, and, according to Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, humankind might be headed in that direction. The deterioration of society is a concept often explored biologically in novels, but less common, is the effect on everyday social constructs such as the position of women as a item that can be distributed and traded-in for a ‘better’ product. The Handmaid’s Tale elaborates the concept that, as societal discrimination towards women intensifies, gender equality deteriorates and certain aspects of societal freedoms are lost. Offred’s experience with serving Gilead demonstrates a victim’s perspective and shows how the occurring changes develope the Republic.

As the narrator walks around the church, they happened to approach the wall. They stopped at the wall and notice dead bodies. The narrator mentions, “ beside the main gateway there are six bodies hanging, by the necks, their hands tied in front of them…” (Atwood 32). These bodies were hanged on the wall for committing a crime. Their hands were tied in front of them and people were able to witness their body being hang on the wall. Sometimes their body would be there for days until there is a new batch. The men bodies were covered in blood and the people who saw them were suppose to feel some kind of hatred and scorn over the dead bodies. However, Offered did not feel that. She stated “what I feel towards them is blankness” (Atwood 33).

I think that some of the women are responsible for their social status and some are victims. Serena Joy, Offred, Moira and ofglen all portray different aspects of the positions mentioned in the text. Of all of them, Serena is the only one I can see that had an active role in the Gilead movement leading up to the coup. It was mentioned that Offred had seen her on TV prior to the coup extolling the virtues of “traditional values” and her position within Gilead leads to speculation that she had at least a peripheral part of the formation and of the establishment of the new order. Her position in the new order, however, is not ideal as she is required to participate in a ceremony where her husband makes love to another woman for the cause.

A Critical Analysis of “The Handmaid’s Tale.” In this dystopia novel, it reveals a remarkable new world called Gilead. “The Handmaid’s Tale,” by Margaret Atwood, explores all these themes about women who are being subjugated to misogyny to a patriarchal society and had many means by which women tried to gain not only their individualism and their own independence. Her purpose of writing this novel is to warn of the price of an overly zealous religious philosophy, one that places women in such a submissive role in the family. I believe there are also statements about class in there, since the poor woman are being meant to serve the rich families need for a child. As the novel goes along the narrator Offred is going between the past and

Margret Atwood’s novel "The Handmaid's Tale" is a dystopian novel based on the drastic reality of totalitarianism. Taking place in a new and improved America the government of Gilead strips less fortunate women of their freedom, to be subjected to make babies for the rich. With the use of literary devices such as symbolism, repetition and character development. Atwood is able to address important social challenges our society is facing today like feminism religious influence and forming your own identity.