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Restriction In The Handmaid's Tale By Margaret Atwood

623 Words3 Pages

Motif: Restriction in Gilead Theme Statement: Restriction in Gilead can make society feel confined and fearful. Thesis: In Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, the restriction of the people in Gilead is used as a motif to display confinement and a sense of fear through stealing, committing suicide, and threatening top-tier figures. Quote/Reasoning #1: Restriction of the people in Gilead can lead to fear and feeling helpless. Along with being confined to her room at night, Offred feels the need to steal something heads to the kitchen, and says, “What I would like to steal is a knife, from the kitchen, but I’m not ready for that” (Atwood 69). Offred has been wanting to steal something for a while but fears that someone will notice and punish her for her actions. She wants to steal something that wouldn’t be noticed such as a daffodil and save it for the handmaid that comes in after her. On the other side, she thinks of stealing a knife for protection and a way to …show more content…

For example, in the book the Commander tells Offred of the handmaid that stayed before her and says, “She hanged herself, he says: thoughtfully, not sadly. That’s why we had the light fixture removed. In your room” (Atwood 131). Offred is asking what the Latin phrase Nolite te bastardes carborundorum means and why it was sketched into the inside of her closet. Committing suicide shows how much pressure and unhappiness one is feeling. The jobs of a handmaid and the living conditions that they are put in are the epitome of the bare minimum. They are confined into such a small space with nothing but a bed and bathroom with an empty closet. Windows open barely halfway, there is no light fixture, and they can’t even own a comb. Having such little control over their life puts fear and pressure to uphold their duties and sometimes they simply cannot handle it

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Throughout The Handmaid’s Tale, the progression of Offred developing a sense of her own choice is slightly more apparent but is shown through the offerings of Gilead. Understanding the choices made by the handmaids and by Offred gives a perspective of how their oppressed freedom is conflicting with their own choices. “Yes, we are very happy,” I murmur. I have to say something else can I say?”(29). The quote symbolizes the fear from Offred and Ofglen about fighting to say the truth about their lives in Gilead, as Offred is struggling to rebel against the rules of Gilead.

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In The Handmaid’s Tale, the oppression of women was the absolute first thing that stood out. The exposing of handmaids inabilities The women that were not able to produce babies such as Offred were sent to this Nazi type regimes called the colonies. There were Guardians or “secret police” watching all of the Handmaids at all times. The Republic of Gilead did something called “Men’s Salvaging”, which occurred when either men, but mostly women got penalized from doing something forbidden and they got hung and killed. Women weren’t able leave their households unless they were going shopping for food.

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To sum it up, Margaret Atwood wrote this book to hint many things in life and one of them is hypocrisy. Sometimes people with authority and power get away with almost anything, which isn’t justifying. Individuals with less power such as the guardian/angel who raped a handmaid got punished for doing the same thing that every commander practices in this new reality. It’s something that is considered a job to them. It is raping because rape come in many forms and there are many types.

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It projects a patriarchy of elite white men who repress the majority of the population through sexist and racist policies. In this puritanical state, Commanders are political leaders and lawmakers who support and contribute to the rise of Gilead. Each Commander possesses a big house, a Wife, Marthas, a driver, and a Handmaid, epitomizing wealth and power. The Gilead society uses Biblical allusions to justify the role of the Commanders. During the Women’s Prayvaganzas, the Commander expresses, “For Adam was first formed, then Eve” (221) where Eve was made as a helper and to complement Adam as a servant rather than function as an equal.

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The Handmaid's Tale Analysis

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Throughout the novel, Moira’s use of informal language and slang is apparent. This is significant because Moira’s crude vocabulary is dramatically different from how the Handmaids are taught to speak, marking her as a dissenter under the restrictive rule of Gilead. For instance, Moira scoffs that the Red Centre is “a loony bin” in Chapter 13. The use of the colloquial noun ‘loony’ to describe the Red Centre establishes a conversational, almost childish tone of voice. This contrasts from the rather mechanic and automated voice Offred has when she becomes a Handmaid, replying with contrived phrases such as “praise be” to other Handmaids.

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Totalitarianism In The Handmaid's Tale

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The Handmaid 's Tale is one of Margaret Atwood most famous novels written during the spring of 1984, when the Berlin wall was still standing. Atwood creates a dystopia, which mostly consists of gender gap and oppression. The Handmaid 's Tale effectively portrays the United States as the modern-day totalitarian society of Gilead, which was illustrated as perfect by using the book of Genesis. Although the authors ideas are inherently and completely fictional, several concepts throughout his book have common links to the past and present society which the author herself calls a speculative fiction. The author uses a totalitarian system which includes aspects of Soviet system, to describe, deprivation, repression and terror with the use of

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Aunt Lydia’s more relevant quote in The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, is the two freedoms, who gives the reader an accurate insight of the Gilead society. This quote exposes the contrast between the freedom before and after the settlement of the Republic of Gilead, and the mentality of the brainwashed nation. It is well known that the Gileadean era is a dystopia, but the reader must study deeper into both societies –Gileadean and pre-Gileadean- to understand which one is really worse. Before the appearing of the Republic of Gilead, freedom was seen as a person’s desire, however, on the Gileadean era, freedom is a collective idea. On the current community, freedom is settled by laws based on moral and social values, but ignoring the

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Handmaid’s whom are the fertile women in the Gilead society, are stripped from all freedom and rights, banned from knowing any form of literature and have to be submissive to men, allowing their bodies to be sexually used to produce children. In contrast, women who are not fertile such as Wives have their freedom taken away too as they are confined to doing assigned jobs around the house. In contrast, the Aunts and the Commanders are shown to have the highest rankings in the Gileadean society. They are powerful figures, with privileges such as the Aunts being allowed to read and write and the Commanders being permitted to get married and have a handmaid's assigned to

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