Even the disturbing yet disconnected story of infant-snatching turns out to be foreshadowing for the stealing of her daughter, living safe somewhere in Gilead and all but dead to her mother (Atwood 206). This is the common thread that ties these flashbacks together: they are all pictures of her suffering, and whether they focus on her past life or her present, they are all problems that she continues to face. As she builds her resolve against the tyranny of Gileadean society, Offred’s memories become longer and piece together like a not-so-beautiful puzzle, tying together the past and the present into a new sense of perspective. One particular moment of reminiscence gives way to nearly a whole chapter of flashback, detailing the collapse of the American society and its slow but steady reduction of the rights of its women (Atwood 173-181). These stolen rights -- frozen accounts, mass layoffs from jobs, taking of private property -- drastically change the image of Gilead, at least to the previously oblivious readers, who prior to this retelling likely could not empathize very well with the protagonist. “...What is revealed in [Offred’s] recollection of the pre-Gilead era is far from being exuberant; her memory is as smeared with fear and anxiety as is her present experience” (Nakamura 8). This anxiety is what many people experience in America today, anxiety about the inevitable dystopian decline of their country, when and what and how. Yet these fears hardly stop Offred from performing her little rebellions; rather, they …show more content…
It is neither comedy nor tragedy, beginning and ending with different forms of adversity, and in this sense it is more of a realistic account of life within a dystopian society. The timeline is confusing and out of place, and every experience has the ability to drastically change the individual’s ambitions, in this case for freedom and