The Handmaid's Tale
by Margaret Atwood
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Book Reviews of The Handmaid's Tale
Book Review: historical fiction
Summary: 4 Stars
The Handmaid's Tale
by Margaret Atwood
Anchor Books, 1998
I should have read The Handmaid's Tale five years ago, when my high school English teacher said "you'll like it," but I didn't. Despite my enormous respect for Ms. Mason's literary taste, I decided to wait. Five years later, on a lunch-break trip to Borders to find something to follow Frederik Pohl's The Boy Who Would Live Forever, I saw it on a shelf, next to Stephen Chbosky's The Perks of Being a Wallflower. I grabbed both.
For those unfamiliar with Handmaid's infamous plot, it follows Offred who is placed into servitude as a surrogate mother for legitimate wives when an act of terrorism disintegrates the American structure of government. The Republic of Gilead, a patriarchal theocracy, forms in its place, and all second marriages and relations outside of marriage are deemed adulterous and their female participants forced into physical or sexual slavery. Atwood's Gilead suggests that the resurrection of extreme religious fanaticism and its anti-feminist consequences are inevitable and inextricable.
Reading the afterword to Handmaid is absolutely imperative to anyone wishing to understand its content. Atwood writes it as a diary reconstructed from audio tapes-a primary historical source discovered over a century after the end of the Gileadean era. For 20th and 21st century readers, Handmaid is meant as a warning. But labeling Offred's diary as a historical document serves other historiographical purposes as well. Atwood reminds us constantly that this is a reconstruction, that its contents are remembered and sometimes envisioned or dreamed. They may not have happened at all, and the way they happened (or will happen) is subject to debate. Atwood's awareness of issues and trends in historiography make Handmaid all the more compelling. It is a reconstruction of future events rather than a prediction. Interpretation informs events and vice-verse. In other words, we may already be living in the Republic of Gilead.
Although Handmaid is a politically and historically charged critique, it is also a work of fiction. Style is at least as important as content. Because Handmaid is written as a reconstructed document, readers are often left wondering about the order of events. Atwood utilizes flashbacks and other temporal devices to infuse Handmaid with ambiguities and disrupt the continuity of Offred's story. While these add to its credibility as a "historical document," they also detract from the story itself. Events that refuse to fit with any of the four primary timelines Atwood creates (one for Offred's "present," one for the historians reviewing Handmaid, one for Offred's husband and daughter, and one for Offred's close friend Moira) become incomprehensible.
Some readers might find Handmaid's moral and political overtones extremist or trite, but this should not deter them from appreciating the enormous effort, thought, and research that must have gone into its creation. Overall, The Handmaid's Tale is a compelling and quick read at 320 pages. 8/10.
Book Review: A Must-Read for Anyone Who Cares about Women's Rights
Summary: 5 Stars
Margaret Atwood, a Canadian novelist (and poet) has written a dark fantasy. The novel is set in The Republic of Gilead, formerly the United States, or at least the parts of it that are not radioactive. The radioactive parts are called the colonies, where bad girls are sent to die of radiation poisoning. The time is the near future, after the inevitable nuclear war, and the breakdown of government as we know it.
This novel was a. Book of the Month Club featured alternate. However, that was a long time ago. It would never be recognized or honored in today's political environment.
The society depicted in The Handmaid's Tale is a nightmare: everyone is watched by the Eyes, possibly the successor to the FBI or CIA, or a home-grown version of the religious police found in some fundamentalist countries in the Middle East. Women are strictly controlled. They are forbidden to have jobs. They may have no money of their own. They are irrevocably assigned to classes.. There are, at the top, the chaste, but morally superior, Wives, almost all of whom have been rendered infertile by the inevitable nuclear war. At the bottom are the housekeepers, or Marthas, who are non-entities. In the middle are the Handmaids of the title, who are fertile, but tightly controlled. Handmaids are forced to have sex with the Commanders, the husbands of the Wives. During this sex, the Wives are intimately present to take in any "love" their Commanders have to give.
The Handmaids are trained to remain unattached to the Commanders. They are prohibited from using makeup or doing anything to make themselves attractive. Handmaids are forced to turn their offspring over to the Wives.
The government is totalitarian and monotheistic. The one god is very strict, and has His Eyes everywhere.
The tale is narrated by Offred. (Her name is derived from: "of Fred", since she exists only because of a man.) Offred is a Handmaid who, despite her training (read brainwashing), recalls her past, her loving husband, and her adored daughter. She tells with sparkling, and terrifying clarity, how the society came to be the way it is.
This governmental aspect of the story is instructive.
A coup d'etat is executed by a group of hardcore fundamentalists. They machine gun the Congress. They then use this lawlessness as an excuse to permanently suspend the Constitution. These religious rebels then enact into "law" an amazingly contemporary assortment of violations of human rights.
Offred's personal story is heartrending. It reminds one of the miseries of, say, the women of Darfur. When the government breaks down, she and her husband and daughter attempt to flee to Canada. Unfortunately, they are caught. Her daughter is "confiscated." Her husband is taken away. She never sees her husband again.
Offred's "training" is described at length and in great detail.
Atwood's writing is compelling. The story is a must-read for anyone with a political conscience.
Book Review: Tasteful ruminations
Summary: 4 Stars
The Gileadian Takeover happened very quickly, and before anyone had a chance to react, martial law was announced, women were robbed of their jobs, and all marriages after the first were declared unlawful. To halt the dropping Caucasian birth rate, unattached able-bodied women were corraled into "Red Centers", where meekness and submissiveness were hammered into them under prison-like conditions. Later, these "handmaids" were redistributed to affluent households, childbearing being their only goal in life. This is the tale of one of these unfortunates: 33-year-old "Offred" can still remember her husband and daughter, being allowed to read and write, but with every passing year this Calvinist society claims more and more of her.Very surprisingly, "The Handmaid's Tale" did not at all strike me as especially feministic. Its dystopia is all the more striking because everyone is discomfited - both the opressor and the opressed. Out of the numerous cautionary tales I've read this is the rare one that takes into account almost every side of the story: whereas others usually pose one side as unjust tyrants and have the other side engage in a just struggle, the quietly nightmarish world of "Handmaid's Tale" is especially appealing in that its central character, a nameless everywoman knows only by a patronimical (Offred - "Of-Fred"), is out not to revolutionize, but to survive. Indeed, this is a tale of finding contentment in the unlikeliest of places, of living day to day, of forming relationships, of adapting, and of coping. Not wasting any more time than necessary on the do-not-resuscitate plot (Offred's eventual escape), Atwood commits every last drop of her writing prowess to examine the personalities of her characters and the numbing effects of the new order. In doing so, in constantly examining and re-examining Offred from every perspective, she makes her so multi-faceted as to make her more than a character - she becomes an excellent interface between the reader and Atwood's conceptual vehicle.
The profoundly disturbing - of not particularly likely to happen - dystopia Atwood creates serves as a stage for examining the various drives and motivations of her characters, using the veil of strangeness to abstract her findings into something approaching objectiveness.
Something I didn't expect was how particularly inert men are in the world of the "Handmaid". While the narrator speaks no more cynically of them than of the women, it is women who seem to run everything, from the general social order to the secret underground. Men appear content - if not especially happy - with their secret burlesques and generally acting as if they still had any real power.
While I enjoyed the gentle manner with which the author maintained my attention despite the poststructuralist approach, there are few memorable ideas that the book communicates. I feel that I will remember it solely for the ludicrous, gruesome visual trappings - and that's quite a misfortune.
Book Review: This is how it may be one day...
Summary: 5 Stars
"Behind the barrier, waiting for us at the narrow gateway, there are two men, in the green uniforms of the Guardians of the Faith, with the crests on their shoulders and berets: two swords, crossed, above a white triangle ... Their youth is touching, but I know I can't be deceived by it. The young ones are often the most dangerous, the most fanatical, the jumpiest with their guns."No, the above passage isn't a scene from the Reconstructionist South or Stalingrad in the early 20th century. It's from The Handmaid's Tale, a frightening novel by Margaret Atwood. And the narrator of those words is an unwilling prisoner in a stifling society, from which death is the only escape.
Known as Offred - her real name was taken away years ago - she functions as a baby-maker in the Republic of Gilead, a fundamentalist Christian society that was called the United States not so many years ago. Her every step, every gesture is monitored by heavily armed spies, who vigilantly watch for any trace of impropriety, any hint of subversiveness. Even a lingering glance at a man could cost Offred her life. "Such moments are the hold out for myself, like the candy I hoarded, as a child, at the back of a drawer," she muses as she glances into the eyes of a guard on her way to the grocery store. A former wife, mother and feminist, Offred holds out hope of leaving Gilead someday, even though the odds are against her.
As the book progresses, Offred's situation becomes more complicated. Her Commander, with whom she is forced to have emotionless sex every month, begins taking her to a brothel. Her mistress Serena arranges for her to have a clandestine affair with chauffeur Nick, so Offred can produce a child for her. And she is temporarily reunited with her best friend Moira, who was once a defiant lesbian but is now a prostitute, devoid of hope and ambition.
Atwood tells her chilling, "1984"-esque tale in elegant prose, interspersing scenes from Offred's current life with her tormented recollections of the way life used to be. "Pieces of paper, thickish, greasy to the touch, green-colored, with pictures on each side," she says of the old monetary system. "You had to take those pieces of paper with you when you went shopping."
Will Offred get out of Gilead and see her husband Luke again? Or will she be labeled an infertile Unwoman and be sent to the Colonies to clean up radioactive waste? With only her memories and an obscure Latin phrase to keep her going, Offred wrestles with these thoughts as she sits in the window of her government-issued bedroom, staring out at a world that is no longer familiar to her.
Part science fiction, part precautionary tale, The Handmaid's Tale reminds us all that we should never take the smallest liberties for granted and that a seemingly stable society can change almost at the drop of a hat. Give it to your favorite feminist, or just someone who likes scary novels. This one isn't frightening because lives are threatened, but because it's entirely possible.
Book Review: A dystopian view of a very possible future for America
Summary: 5 Stars
Atwood's story of an America taken over by Christian fundamentalists in the not-very-far future is chilling. It's chilling because, unlike similar novels, such as Orwell's 1984, "The Handmaid's Tale" is not very far fetched. In fact, it's a very possible result if the current trends in America continue. We see the very dire consequences of anti-American trends such as "The Patriot Act" and the breaking down of the barriers between Church and State. The future described by Atwood here is the natural extension of these trends. Atwood wrote this novel 20 years ago, yet she was visionary enough to see the trends.Atwood slowly reveals the "mystery" about what is going on. This technique holds our attention and builds our sympathy for Offred (the handmaid) and the other oppressed women in Atwood's post-Ashcroft/Bush world. We see things from Offred's point-of-view. We also have access to her memories of a not-so-distant past when Americans still could enjoy such things as liberty, religious freedom, privacy and safety of life.
The victimization of women; the dire consequences of destroying the environment to the extent that the very ability of the human race to procreate is jeopardized; the tearing down of the boundaries between religion and government -- the result is future that is dark for the individual. When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Well, those in power take a bad situation (that they,themselves, created) and turn it to their advantage. They make lemonade for themselves and spit the pits back at the citizens, particularly at fertile women. Right-wing religious fundamentalists turn democracy into theocracy. The ironic result is a perversion of the very Christian values that, today, fundamentalists impose on people who may have different religious beliefs than they have.
Part of the power of the narrative is the revelation that the events leading to this dark, dystopia are recent events. The characters have lived in a free America and remember it. The transformation happened, if not overnight, very quickly. "Temporary" laws are passed that limit certain freedoms but, not only are these "temporary" laws never repealed, they become increasingly totalitarian until even having thoughts about freedom and rights becomes a crime. (You are either on the side of those in power or you are evil, on the side of "bad guys" and do not deserve to live.) Although Atwood created this fictional world decades before the "Patriot Act", she paints a world that is ruled by laws that, like the "Patriot Act, are designed to eliminate liberties and put the quality of American lives at risk.
We live in the times that preceded the changes remembered by "Offred" (the handmaid). Our children and grandchildren may very well live in the times that Offred and the other handmaids find themselves in.
"The Handmaid's Tale" is a moving, gripping story, but also a very important story.