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The Handmaid's Tale By Margaret Atwood

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Recommended: Role of men in the handmaid's tale

Adrianne Bunch Ms. Steuer English IV 18 February 2023 A Man’s World It is a man’s world, but that is nothing without a woman. Margaret Atwood, a feminist author, believes it is truly a woman’s world. In a society where names have vanished, families are separated, and women are brainwashed, main character Offred tries to find a way back to reality from the oppressionist leaders that have captured her. Often times when utopian societies are sought after, oppression is a main side effect because perfect is unattainable and not the same for everyone. In the dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood creates neologisms, chauvinistic metaphors, and symbolism of cigarettes, Luke, and the color red in order to convey that misogynistic authority …show more content…

By allowing the main character to take a small taste of the cigarette, Atwood is revealing another moment of hope for a better future. When Offred got the chance of smoking again, she said the smoke “makes [her] dizzy” because she has not had it in a long time (Atwood 272). This small taste of freedom is used as a motivation to relieve herself of the dystopian society. Atwood characterizes Offred and Moira as having “recollections of the freedom and happiness” when cigarettes are grasped to help them “maintain crucial ties to her past life and thus to a sense of identity" (“The Handmaid’s Tale” [Napierkowski] 129). Atwood correlates cigarettes as a personal boost to Offred to help her find her identity and push for what she deserves. The purpose of this is to explain to readers that oppression can be overcome, and patriarchal societies can be manipulated into an equal society. In another occurrence in the novel, Atwood strategically correlates how Offred is with a man that “saw the look on [her] face” and “mistook it for something else,” when in reality, she only “really… wanted was the cigarette" showing a current day issue with women and men. Atwood is attempting to explain to readers that men often assume something based on the look of something, and instead of asking they decide to make their own solution. This can be relative to …show more content…

Atwood organizes the novel to follow the challenges the protagonist faces as a women in a misogynistic society and dedicates Luke to be her savior. By Atwood providing him, readers can infer that Offred sees him as a piece of hope for a better future. For example, as more time passes by without him in her life, her memory of him “recedes, and [she] become[s] more faithless" (Atwood 281). Atwood integrates the word faithless as a key point to symbolize that Luke is a character for faith. Recognizing circumstances, Atwood provides a symbol of hope to allude that even though women are oppressed, they will continue to motivate themselves so that they can fight back. Atwood’s “heroine constantly yearns” for Luke to conclude that he is Offred’s support system (“The Handmaid’s Tale” [Napierkowski] 134). Atwood implements this into the story by criticizing oppression from men, which shows she is emphasizing that men are needed. Atwood indicates the focus of the story on oppression towards women, rather than the people who are doing the oppression. By doing this, Atwood’s inclusion makes it slightly ironic because men are the reason women are oppressed in the novel. Another way Atwood organizes Offred to need Luke is because she wants to be “told her name…valued” and “be more than valuable” (Atwood 97). Atwood writes this novel to remove names from

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Throughout the novel The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood portrays a world built upon the ideals of male leaders through the lens of a woman subject to the terrors that this world inflicts. In response to falling fertility rates and progressive ideologies, a group of powerful men are motivated to concoct a society based entirely upon their religious ideals to further both their reign over the female population and their success as leaders. Through the experience of a woman living at the expense of these ideas, Atwood communicates the negative consequences of idealism in the hands of a man, and the consequences of a religion-based idealistic world. Throughout the Handmaid's Tale, Atwood portrays a dystopian world by the name of Gilead, where

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Imagine living in a place where everything you do is heavily criticized and self-expression is not allowed. A world in which everyone and everything is closely controlled and one gets punished if rules are not followed. In the novel The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, in the dystopian society of Gilead, the oppressive system forces its citizens to follow assigned roles and rules by being highly critical and manipulative. Throughout the story, Atwood presents the characters through a series of events, which show the impacts on the society. The points of view of Offred, the Aunts, Janine and the other Handmaids on females reveal how an oppressive community forces women to objectify themselves.

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In Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, the author introduces a dystopian future in which a second American Civil War has broken out due to declining birth rates and environmental disasters. Resulting in the rise of the Republic of Gilead, that enforces rigid social roles and enslaves the few remaining fertile women. In an effort to educate and warn those who listen to her story, the narrator tells of her experiences and thoughts during a time when she was deprived of all freedoms. Atwood conveys the theme, status defines worth within this totalitarian regime; this message is shown through the significance of the title, point of view, and symbolism throughout the novel.

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The message Atwood wants the reader to receive is a warning, that the freedoms we consider rights and take for granted could be taken away from us at any moment. In The Handmaid’s Tale Offred was just an ordinary person like anyone else. She took her freedoms for granted too, it was an ordinary day when she had gone to buy some cigarettes from the corner store. However, it wasn’t an ordinary day, it was the day the society of Gilead began to rise. When Offred went to go pay for her cigarettes, the man punched in her numbers one by one.

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Works of literature often portray ideas relating to Marxist theory, this is why in a dystopian society, class distinctions dominate the social climate, using Marxist ideologies as a tool to define the lives of the narrator and those around her. In Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, ideologies from Marxist theory dominate the society in which Offred, the narrator, lives in, evidenced by the strict class systems and limited interaction between them. In writing the novel, Atwood makes a point to create a world that could exist using technology and ideas already accessible in today’s society, meaning the events that take place in The Handmaid’s Tale could happen in present day. Offred lives in a reality where class distinctions dominate society, and women, especially fertile women. These women are displaced downwards, although there are those women who attempt to resist the grip of society.

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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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