Women In The Handmaid's Tale

Imagine a world where women cannot read or write. Women cannot own property, work, or even have a bank account. These are things only a man can do. Women are only to cook, clean, and bear children, then care for them. This world may seem like the world before the twentieth century. However, in the late 21st century, this is the future and society of Gilead. This is the world in which Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, takes setting in. The novel is told in a first person account by Offred, a Handmaid. Through her, the reader learns about the rules and regulations a Handmaid of Gileadean society must obey. The reader learns about how different women are classified into sects and that each has a permanent role in society. This classification

For example, Offred, who is not allowed to use any beauty products, steals a pat of butter to use as lotion before the Ceremony where the Commander tries to impregnate her. When she describes this act to the Commander later, she talks about how Handmaids do this because they have no other option. Offred then asks the Commander for actual hand lotion, which is a forbidden act, “ black market stuff. All things we aren’t supposed to have.” (Atwood 159) When Offred commits these small acts of rebellion that only a handmaid can commit, she is taking back some control of her life and becoming slightly less oppressed under the regime of the government and society. She is able to get a item that was so common Pre Gilead and gain a little power in Gilead. Offred is not allowed beauty products, but by using lotion, she gets to revisit a part of her life where she was free to do anything she wanted. She is displaying how oppressed women look for opportunities to rebel. Offered see that the Commander is able to get her lotion, and thus asks him for it. She is rebelling the only way she knows how. This type of small rebellion is seen again when Serena Joy has Offred leave right after the Ceremony. Though Serena Joy is supposed to have Offred rest for ten minutes in her position before

These tapes are studied all over the world, and taught by Professor Peixoto. Though it is not clear that Offred is the one who recorded these tapes, it is implied. Professor Peixoto shares many different versions of what could have happened to the creator of the tapes. Peixoto goes on to share how the reader will never really know what happened to Offred because “as all the historians know, the past is a great darkness, and filled with echoes. Voices may reach us from it; but what they say to us is imbued with the obscurity of the matrix out of which they come; and, try as we may, we cannot always decipher them precisely in the clearer light of our own day.” (Atwood 311). Through this statement, the professor is stating how the past is really unknown to those who have not lived through it and told the tale. What really happened in that moment is only known to those in that time, going through that period of history, and living in that world. This summarizes a theme that seen throughout the novel: “The past is of those who lived it, the rest of us just try to come up with scenarios that may have happened.” This theme is seen previously when Offred tries to figure out what may have happened to Luke, her husband. She comes up with three different ideas: he was able to escape, he was in jail for trying to escape, or he was dead. (Atwood 104-106) It is