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Critical analysis of dystopian literature
Critically analyse Margaret Atwood as a novelist
Critically analyse Margaret Atwood as a novelist
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The Handmaid's Tale
The Handmaids Tale, written by Margaret Attwood, goes on to explore the consequences that come to be from the reversal of womens rights in a society called Gilead. It is what one can consider a cautionary tale. In the new world of Gilead, a group of conservative religious extremists have taken power, and have turned the sexual revolution upside down. The society of Gilead is founded on what is to be considered a return to traditional values, gender roles and the subjugation of women by men, and the Bible is used as the guiding principle. It differs completely from the society, which was once the place in which Feminists argued for liberation from the traditional gender roles. What women had worked hard for in the area of gaining rights to birth control, legalization of abortion and an increasing number of active female voters, had been completely reversed in a short period of time. Not only were women now forbidden to vote in Gilead, they were also denied the right to read or write, according to the new laws of the establishment. The Handmaids Tale portrays that of a totalitarian society, and reflects a dystopia, which goes on to explore the interaction between sexuality and politics.
The main character within the novel is Offred, who also happens to be a handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. Offred is not the Narrators real name; it is her handmaid name, which is derived from the word of followed by her Commanders name. Because of low birth rates, Handmaids are assigned to bear the children for the elite couples within Gilead, who have trouble conceiving. Offred serves the Commander and his wife Serena Joy. Serena was once an advocate for the concept of traditional values, before the establishment of Gi...
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...ppression and the dangers of a patriarchal society. The Handmaid's Tale has many elements of social decline written into its plot. From the way women are mistreated to the way corruption and evil have infiltrated the government and army, to the way the black market plays a key role in many people's lives causing a majority of society to become criminals makes it clear how social decline plays a key role in the book. There is also a strong sense of moral decline in the book. If a person, regardless of sex, doesn't fit into the role expectation, he or she is eliminated, exiled from Gilead, and left for dead. Dystopia, the final determinant in the success of The Handmaid's Tale is an imaginary world gone sour through idealism that fails to correspond to the expectations, principles, and behaviors of real people.
Works Cited
Atwood, Margaret. The Handmaids Tale
First, the government used a dangerous literal interpretation of a Biblical passage as justification for adultery under the guise of reproduction. Second, the state constantly reinforced its falsified morality by saturating daily routines with religious expressions. Lastly, the regime altered Biblical references to further its political goals, and then prohibited language to prevent exposing its duplicity. Although Gilead rather effectively erased women’s values to construct a hyper-patriarchy, The Handmaid’s Tale provides a voice for this silenced population.
College athletes generate millions of dollars for their schools each year, yet they are not allowed to be compensated beyond a scholarship due to being considered amateurs. College athletes are some of the hardest working people in the nation, having to focus on both school courses and sports. Because athletics take so much time, these student-athletes are always busy. College football and basketball are multi-billion dollar businesses. The NCAA does not want to pay the athletes beyond scholarships, and it would be tough to work a new compensation program into the NCAA and university budgets. College athletes should be compensated in some form because they put in so much time and effort, generating huge amounts of revenue.
Offred is a Handmaid, who is thought of as the most and least important people in the caste system; "they rank among the most powerful female agents of the patriarchal order." (Callaway 50). The Handmaids have one thing that all the women in Gilead want – fertility. Their fertility ma...
.... Since Wives do not have the ability to have a baby, they ask Handmaids to sleep with their husbands once a month to bear a baby. Their husbands cannot see Handmaids except for every month’s Ceremony. Because the husband cannot kiss and touch Handmaids when they have sex, the husbands go to night clubs to dally with Jezebels. In this society, women each have a function and become the victims of patriarchal ruling. Once we lapse in dealing with the gender relationship, what will the situation be for the entire human society? In The Handmaid’s Tale, Atwood puts this worry into her feminist dystopia, a real nightmare. Although the sufferings everyone undertakes in the novel will not occur in the real world, the novel conceives a unique, horrible social panorama, exaggerating and magnifying the gender tension in the real world, containing the criticism of reality.
The oxford dictionary refers to the word “utopia” as being a place of “paradise, heaven on earth” as well as perfection. It can be labeled as a place that is the most desirable in any nation on earth and can sum up what we as humans search for. “A Handmaid’s Tale” depicts a twisted, yet not to far off, version of our country not to long ago when we lived in the opposite of this so-called paradise. No word can describe this story better than the opposite of utopia, a “dystopian” society. The entire U.S. government fell into a dystopian-type ruling when the very laws created by the government served to treat women as no more than maids and harlots. In this chaotic story, Margaret Atwood depicts a society where men and women fall into the rules of the old testament based on older beliefs describing women as lesser individuals compared to men. Atwood shows the similarities between the Republic of Gilead and the way we used to see the roles of women as well as some aspects of society today. Her overall reason for creating this story is to show her readers around the world the scary truth and effects of the belittlement of women and disregarding them as more than just wives and housemaids.
College athletes should be paid! College athletes are often considered to be some of the luckiest students in the world. Most of them receiving all inclusive scholarships that cover all the costs of their education. They are also in a position to make a reputation for themselves in the sporting world preparing them for the next step. The ongoing debate whether student athletes should be paid has been going on for years. These athletes bring in millions of dollars for their respective schools and receive zero in return. Many will argue that they do receive payment, but in reality it is just not true. Costs associated with getting a college education will be discussed, information pertaining to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), and benefits student athletes receive. First, I’ll start with costs associated with college and most of all why student athletes should be paid!
Woods, Al. “College Athletes Should Be Paid.” Sports and Athletes: An Anthology. Ed. Christine Watkins. Greenhaven Press, 2009. 87-94. Print.
In Margaret Atwood’s, The Handmaid’s Tale, women are subjected to unthinkable oppression. Practically every aspect of their life is controlled, and they are taught to believe that their only purpose is to bear children for their commander. These “handmaids” are not allowed to read, write or speak freely. Any type of expression would be dangerous to the order of the Gilead’s strict society. They are conditioned to believe that they are safer in this new society. Women are supposedly no longer exploited or disrespected (pornography, rape, etc.) as they once were. Romantic relationships are strongly prohibited because involving emotion would defeat the handmaid’s sole purpose of reproducing. Of course not all women who were taken into Gilead believed right what was happening to their way of life. Through the process of storytelling, remembering, and rebellion, Offred and other handmaids cease to completely submit to Gilead’s repressive culture.
There are many people out there that believe that college athletes should not be paid because they are called to be a student first and an athlete second (Farrey). There are an ample amount of people and articles that suggest that paying college athletes is unfair and that they do not deserve to be compensated for their contributions to their respective schools. These people argue that these athletes and “st...
Walker, Jim. "Paying College Athletes Debate Continues." McClatchy - Tribune Business NewsJun 08 2011. ProQuest. Web. 26 Nov. 2013 .
In Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, Atwood creates a society of oppression in which she redefines oppression in common culture. Gilead is a society characterized by highly regulated systems of social control and extreme regulation of the female body. The instinctive need to “protect and preserve” the female body is driven by the innate biological desires of the men. The manipulation of language, commodification, and attire, enhances the theme of oppression and highlights the imbalance of power in the Gilead society.
Why? Our oceans cover nearly three fourths of the surface of our earth. According to overfishing.org, eighty percent of all life on earth is in the ocean, and us humans are threatening and driving them to extinction by overfishing. What is overfishing? Overfishing is defined as “To fish (a body of water) to such a degree as to upset the ecological balance or cause depletion of living creatures.” (Merriam Webster Dictionary) Recent studies from the Environmental Defense Fund reveal a bleak truth: Overfishing is depleting our oceans of sea life around the world. 87% of the world’s assessed fish stocks are at their breaking point, classified as overexploited or fully exploited. 1 out of 2 fish stocks in the U.S. are either overfished or at risk of being overfished. Moreover, 100 million sharks are killed each year. Carl Safina, world-renowned author of books such as Song for the Blue Ocean, once said, “If you're overfishing at the top of the food chain, and acidifying the ocean at the bottom, you're creating a squeeze that could conceivably collapse the whole system.” Overfishing is classified as the most dangerous threat our oceans are facing today. Worldwide, about 90% of fish stocks are gone forever. In 1990 our oceans contained at least six times more fish than they do today. Collapsing fish stocks create large ecological dead zones in our
Throughout time women have been oppressed. The journey women have had has been a long one. Women were oppressed from choosing whom to love, speaking against her husband or any male, getting jobs outside household duties, voting, etc. Women were looked at as the weaker sex. The oppression in Gilead is no different. These women are oppressed by the patriarchy. In Gilead women are valuable, but not all are treated as such. Handmaids play a role for the greater good, but the Wives are treated above the Handmaids, even though the Handmaids, such as the narrator Offred, are the ones giving society a chance. The patriarchal society set in place makes all of the decisions over the greater women populations. Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale examines the overall effect of a patriarchal society on
In recapitulation, then, Margaret Atwood's "The Handmaid's Tale" presents misogyny within Gilead as a government policy that debases women in order to promote functionality. Such extreme implications, as Atwood suggests, are echoed in the cultures preceding Gilead, and even those cultures that are present in our world. Atwood's writing also proposes that sexism is prevalent and deeply embedded in society, even outside of Gilead where it's embedding may not be intentional.
"The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood is a dystopia about a world where unrealistic things take place. The events in the novel could never actually take place in our reality." This is what most people think and assume, but they're wrong. Look at the world today and in the recent past, and there are not only many situations that have ALMOST become a Gilead, but places that have been and ARE Gileadean societies. We're not in Kansas any more, Dorothy!