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The Handmaid's Tale
The Handmaid's Tale is a futuristic dystopian novel by Canadian author Margaret Atwood published in 1985. It is set in a near-future New England in a patriarchal, totalitarian theonomic state known as the Republic of Gilead, which has overthrown the United States government. Offred is the central character and narrator and one of the "Handmaids": women who are forcibly assigned to produce children for the "Commanders", who are the ruling class in Gilead.
The novel explores themes of powerless women in a patriarchal society, loss of female agency and individuality, suppression of reproductive rights, and the various means by which women resist and try to gain individuality and independence. The title echoes the component parts of Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales, which is a series of connected stories (such as "The Merchant's Tale" and "The Parson's Tale"). It also alludes to the tradition of fairy tales where the central character tells her story.
The Handmaid's Tale won the 1985 Governor General's Award and the first Arthur C. Clarke Award in 1987; it was also nominated for the 1986 Nebula Award, the 1986 Booker Prize, and the 1987 Prometheus Award. In 2022, The Handmaid's Tale was included on the "Big Jubilee Read" list of 70 books by Commonwealth authors, selected to celebrate the Platinum Jubilee of Elizabeth II. The book has been adapted into a 1990 film, a 2000 opera, a 2017 television series, and other media. A sequel novel, The Testaments, was published in 2019.
After staging an attack killing the President of the United States and most of United States Congress, a radical political group called the "Sons of Jacob" uses theonomic ideology to launch a revolution. The Constitution of the United States is suspended, newspapers are censored, and the United States is reformed into a military dictatorship known as the Republic of Gilead. The new regime quickly consolidates its power, overtaking all other religious groups, including Christian denominations.
The regime reorganizes society using a peculiar interpretation of some Old Testament ideas, and a new militarized, hierarchical model of social and religious theonomy is established among its new social classes. One of the most significant changes is the limitation of women's rights. Women are relegated to the lowest-ranking class and are denied the right to own property, read, and write. Women are deprived of control over their reproductive functions. Although the regime controls most of the country, various rebel groups continue to operate.
The story is told in the first person by a woman named Offred, considered a criminal for trying to escape to Canada with a forged passport with her husband and five-year-old daughter; she is also considered an adulterer for being married to a divorced man. Her marriage was forcibly dissolved, and her daughter was taken from her. Instead of being sentenced under the Republic of Gilead's draconian criminal justice system, Offred accepted training to become a "Handmaid" at the Rachel and Leah Centre, an alternative only available to fertile women: environmental pollution and radiation have drastically affected fertility, and she is one of the few remaining women who can conceive. She has been assigned to produce children for the "Commanders", the ruling class of men, and is made a Handmaid, a role based on the biblical story of Rachel and her handmaid Bilhah. Handmaids are called by a patronymic constructed “of” + the first name of the head of their households; their names change as they change households.
Women are classed socially, their rank indicated by the color and design of their clothing. From highest to lowest, the Commanders' Wives are clad in sky blue, their unmarried daughters in white, the Handmaids in red with obvious large white bonnets, the Aunts (who train and indoctrinate the Handmaids) in brown, the Marthas (cooks and maids, possibly unmarried sterile women past child-bearing years) in green, Econowives (the wives of lower-ranking men who handle everything in the domestic sphere) in blue, red and green stripes, and widows in black.
Offred details her life, starting with her third assignment as a Handmaid to a Commander. Interspersed between the narrative of her present-day experiences are flashbacks of her life before and during the beginning of the revolution, including her failed escape, indoctrination by the Aunts, and her friend Moira's escape from the indoctrination facility. At her new home, she is treated poorly by the Commander's wife, Serena Joy, a former Christian media personality who supported women's domesticity and subordinate role well before Gilead was established.
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The Handmaid's Tale
The Handmaid's Tale is a futuristic dystopian novel by Canadian author Margaret Atwood published in 1985. It is set in a near-future New England in a patriarchal, totalitarian theonomic state known as the Republic of Gilead, which has overthrown the United States government. Offred is the central character and narrator and one of the "Handmaids": women who are forcibly assigned to produce children for the "Commanders", who are the ruling class in Gilead.
The novel explores themes of powerless women in a patriarchal society, loss of female agency and individuality, suppression of reproductive rights, and the various means by which women resist and try to gain individuality and independence. The title echoes the component parts of Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales, which is a series of connected stories (such as "The Merchant's Tale" and "The Parson's Tale"). It also alludes to the tradition of fairy tales where the central character tells her story.
The Handmaid's Tale won the 1985 Governor General's Award and the first Arthur C. Clarke Award in 1987; it was also nominated for the 1986 Nebula Award, the 1986 Booker Prize, and the 1987 Prometheus Award. In 2022, The Handmaid's Tale was included on the "Big Jubilee Read" list of 70 books by Commonwealth authors, selected to celebrate the Platinum Jubilee of Elizabeth II. The book has been adapted into a 1990 film, a 2000 opera, a 2017 television series, and other media. A sequel novel, The Testaments, was published in 2019.
After staging an attack killing the President of the United States and most of United States Congress, a radical political group called the "Sons of Jacob" uses theonomic ideology to launch a revolution. The Constitution of the United States is suspended, newspapers are censored, and the United States is reformed into a military dictatorship known as the Republic of Gilead. The new regime quickly consolidates its power, overtaking all other religious groups, including Christian denominations.
The regime reorganizes society using a peculiar interpretation of some Old Testament ideas, and a new militarized, hierarchical model of social and religious theonomy is established among its new social classes. One of the most significant changes is the limitation of women's rights. Women are relegated to the lowest-ranking class and are denied the right to own property, read, and write. Women are deprived of control over their reproductive functions. Although the regime controls most of the country, various rebel groups continue to operate.
The story is told in the first person by a woman named Offred, considered a criminal for trying to escape to Canada with a forged passport with her husband and five-year-old daughter; she is also considered an adulterer for being married to a divorced man. Her marriage was forcibly dissolved, and her daughter was taken from her. Instead of being sentenced under the Republic of Gilead's draconian criminal justice system, Offred accepted training to become a "Handmaid" at the Rachel and Leah Centre, an alternative only available to fertile women: environmental pollution and radiation have drastically affected fertility, and she is one of the few remaining women who can conceive. She has been assigned to produce children for the "Commanders", the ruling class of men, and is made a Handmaid, a role based on the biblical story of Rachel and her handmaid Bilhah. Handmaids are called by a patronymic constructed “of” + the first name of the head of their households; their names change as they change households.
Women are classed socially, their rank indicated by the color and design of their clothing. From highest to lowest, the Commanders' Wives are clad in sky blue, their unmarried daughters in white, the Handmaids in red with obvious large white bonnets, the Aunts (who train and indoctrinate the Handmaids) in brown, the Marthas (cooks and maids, possibly unmarried sterile women past child-bearing years) in green, Econowives (the wives of lower-ranking men who handle everything in the domestic sphere) in blue, red and green stripes, and widows in black.
Offred details her life, starting with her third assignment as a Handmaid to a Commander. Interspersed between the narrative of her present-day experiences are flashbacks of her life before and during the beginning of the revolution, including her failed escape, indoctrination by the Aunts, and her friend Moira's escape from the indoctrination facility. At her new home, she is treated poorly by the Commander's wife, Serena Joy, a former Christian media personality who supported women's domesticity and subordinate role well before Gilead was established.