The Implications of Progress in 'The Handmaid's Tale'

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Recommended: Critically analyse Margaret Atwood as a novelist

Nathan Arnold
Mrs. Pixler
4A
December 10, 2015
Progress: The Benefits and its Setbacks Progress is measured in many different and exciting ways. Government progress is very different from the progress of say a sport. In the novel The Handmaid’s Tale written by Margaret Atwood there are many examples of this is both a positive and destructive way. It entails the story of a young women who becauses property of a man in an economy where the population is declining greatly. Her job is to shop for the food to feed the others like her and the rest of the house. The wife of the man is unable to have children and this is why she works there. All fertile women are expected to have sexual intercourses with her master and bare the children of tomorrow. …show more content…

Many of the women and children were dying in the streets or schools from muggings, assaults, or rape. Atwood stated in her book ”I liked watching these people… they were miserable, starving, emaciated, straining themselves to death”(152). They are trying to end what has already happened in the past to bring the society to an end like it is becoming now. There are many people that are trying to leave the cities or sneak in to bomb and kill as many as possible. On page 42 it says “Beside the main gateway there are six more bodies hanging, by the necks, their hands tied in front of them, their heads in white bags tipped sideways onto their shoulders” (Atwood). These men were hung for being part of the rebellion and were caught trying to sneak in. Also they could be hung for breaking the laws being either a doctor and impregnating a girl or doing illegal abortions. Other handmaids would get jealous of the special treatment that the pregnant women received and would kill them in the bathrooms or while walking around getting the groceries. An example of this is “Last week they shot a woman, right about here. She was a Martha. She was fumbling in her robe” (Atwood 27). Women are watched and examined constantly, the slightest wrong movement could cost them their lives …show more content…

They are trying to progress but end up going backwards. Too much control mixed with the lack of civilization will be its downfall, they are their own worst enemy. Progress is taken many ways, they were able to help the people repopulate but also have the people. Progress towards perfection has its own challenges. Works Cited
Atwood, Margaret. The Handmaid's Tale. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1986.

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