In her novel The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood is criticising how today’s modern society oppresses women through a fictional dystopian society. In this piece, women are depicted as property and their sole purpose is bearing children. From a historical aspect, the notion that women are lesser versions of men is not a new concept. Even though the book was written in 1985, Margaret Atwood’s comparisons to how women are treated still stand the test of time in today’s 2018. In order to fully understand the underlying meanings of The Handmaid’s Tale and the critiques that Atwood is making of today’s society, you have to look at the social and political issues going on at the time the book was written. In 1973, the ground-breaking case Roe vs. …show more content…
Like most pieces of literature, colors play a big role in the symbolism of The Handmaid’s Tale. Atwood uses colors to show the caste system in her dystopian society. Black worn by the commanders is because they are considered superior because they are men. The Wives wear blue to represent their nobility or status. The Handmaid has to wear red because that symbolizes importance, danger, and emotion which comes with their task of bearing children. And finally the Marthas, wear green which draws on the term “green with envy” which is what the Mathas feel toward the Handmaids. So even though colors, Atwood is able to portray the stereotype that women can either be noble, child bearers, or jealous while the men get to be superior and their color is also not based on their job in …show more content…
This is best expressed in the novel through All Flesh and Milk and Honey, stores that are only named on the storefront by pictures like a children’s book. Intelligence is an unnecessary tool for women. Women’s jobs are to take care of children and husbands. This concept is still relevant in 2018. When the book was written in 1985, the average women made 64 cents to the man’s dollar. This can be attributed to sexism in the workplace, because women are often seen as not able to handle positions of power or have the skills to perform. Atwood expresses this stereotype by the gender roles presented in her society, and even though the wage gap has been closing slowly (in 2015 it was a woman’s 79 cents to a man’s dollar) the Institute for Women’s Policy Research estimate women won’t receive equal pay til
Margaret Atwood’s novel The Handmaid’s Tale is a story heavily influenced by the Bible and has many biblical themes that are used to prove Atwood’s belief in balance. The novel is set in the Republic of Gilead, which was formerly the United States. The story is told through the perspective of a handmaid named Offred and begins when she is placed at her third assignment as a housemaid. Offred describes her society as a fundamentalist theocracy where the Christian God is seen as the divine Ruler over the Republic of Gilead.
In The Handmaid’s Tale Atwood shows the negative consequences of a society where women have no role in government and politics.
Impacted by her love to read and write she used situations that she experienced or read about in newspapers to create every piece of her novel. An example in her historical context was the customs that she witnessed on a trip to Afghanistan it states “she observed behaviors that concerned her -- a man who only spoke to her partner and not to her, and the existence of the full-body coverings for women, known in Afghanistan as chadors.” This quote shows two specific ideals that you also see in the Handmaid 's tale, the lack of female equality and the clothing that women wore. Atwood was obviously greatly affected by both of these things because they are major parts of the society and the storyline. Another quote from the historical context of Margaret Atwood describes an event that happened in the US during the time Atwood was a politically aware individual it states “a group known as the “Moral Majority” -- or a group of Christian fundamentalists led by the preacher Jerry Falwell. The Moral Majority promoted an agenda that was focused on religiously inspired views, such as outlawing abortion, opposing recognition of homosexuality and the Equal Rights Amendment (a law that would guarantee equal rights for women), enforcing a “traditional” view of family life (with the man as the head of the household), and censoring any media that did not fit the views they had.” Again this quote shows a few of the major ideals of the society in The Handmaid 's Tale. The agenda of religiously inspired views and the enforcement of a traditional family. Atwood put these into her book to show how if these people had gotten control over the government what our future could possibly look
Many texts that were published from different authors have introduced topics that can be related in today’s society, but Margaret Atwood’s creation called, “The Handmaid’s Tale”, gives voice to the thoughts and revolves around the narrator Offred, a woman whose rights have been deprived due to political issues. However, the information shared by Offred to the reader to the text is not reliable for the reason that she only touches upon her own perspective. Through the text, Atwood depicted what the United States of America would be in the future based on the actions of humanity during 1980’s. The text is set up in an androcentric and totalitarian country called Gilead, where the government attempts to create a utopian society. Thus, in order to attain this society, the authorities generated their legislation from the teachings of the Holy Bible in an attempt to control humanity. The governing
Margaret Atwood’s dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale depicts many aspects of humanity at times of crisis as the protagonist, and narrator, of this novel is experiencing and seen through her eyes throughout the novel. The form of government in this novel is totalitarian with Christianity guidelines in which men have higher roles and women are put into submission and into supporting roles with no equal footing as it one was before and where Offred is forced to adjust with these new restrictions. Throughout the centuries, women have been put into submitting rules mainly due to their physical appearances; the dainty hands, smooth skin, and their natural motherly nature are seen as weak and should be an object of protection. It is true that women do not possess the physical strength that the male sex do, as it is seen throughout Atwood’s novel where the male military Commanders wield considerable power over the lesser male roles, women such as Offred are highly valued not for their strength but for their fertility. Although women have made considerable progress in putting themselves in an equal standing in society today, as can be seen with the number of women in government and highly appointed job positions, there is still that underlying prejudice that women are inferior. “Women hold 17 percent of the seats in Congress”, says Jessica Valenti in the popular newspaper The Washington Post, and follows with the argument that “more than 85 percent of counties in the United States have no provider; women work outside the home, but they make about 76 cents to a man's dollar and make up the majority of Americans living in poverty”.
...s redeeming qualities, they are not shown in this book. It is a society deeply rooted in what it thinks is the common good, but what is really ironic and satirical in the most painful way. Instead of creating a utopia, the government created a dystopia; a place that took away basic rights using the pretense of improvement. Gilead is the essence of a society that reaches for perfection but never quite gets there before the cracks start to show. Neuman’s critical insights on The Handmaid’s Tale and its relationship with feminism were invaluable in helping us to realize how truly sad this book is, and Atwood succeeded in showing us the satirical shortcomings of Gilead through her use of characters, theme, and feminist ideals. In addition, she showed us that the novel still has relevance, because all societies, no matter how perfect they pretend to be, have their flaws.
The Handmaid's Tale is a dystopian novel in which Atwood creates a world which seems absurd and near impossible. Women being kept in slavery only to create babies, cult like religious control over the population, and the deportation of an entire race, these things all seem like fiction. However Atwood's novel is closer to fact than fiction; all the events which take place in the story have a base in the real world as well as a historical precedent. Atwood establishes the world of Gilead on historical events as well as the social and political trends which were taking place during her life time in the 1980's. Atwood shows her audience through political and historical reference that Gilead was and is closer than most people realize.
On the surface, The Handmaid's Tale appears to be feminist in nature. The point-of-view character and narrator is a woman and thus we see the world through a woman's eyes. There's much more to the story than that, though. Atwood doesn't show us our world. She shows us a newly created world in which women lack the freedoms that they currently take for granted. This dystopian society is completely controlled by men. Of course, the men have help from the Aunts, a crack team of brainwashers that run the reeducation centers and teach the handmaids how to be slaves. These characters really don't speak well for womankind for two reasons. First of all, it's difficult to tell who their real life counterpart is, assuming that this...
Another way the women in The Handmaid’s Tale are unequal to men is in dress. In modern society it is normal to think of clothing as a way to express our personality and individuality. What you wear helps others know who you are. In the novel, the main character Offred grew up in a westernized world –freedoms like self expression and speech- but it was taken away from her when she became a handmaid.
Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid's Tale,” is overflowing with references to overpowering masculinity, negative sexualization and oppressive authority, obviously lacking any slight expression of femininity. The most relevant mention of femininity can be found in the recurring references to the diverse flowers. A flower, is often seens as a symbol of beauty, fertility or femininity. However, in “The Handmaid’s Tale” the presences of certain flowers seem to reflect objects that have the ability to bloom or grow, unlike the woman, potentially symbolizing a sense of freedom or self-growth. Additionally, in a more literal way a flower can be seen as the part of the plant that hosts the reproductive organs, thus drawing attention to the woman who lack
As our world evolves, mankind consistently has to overcome obstacles. These obstacles often pertain to the differences we have as human beings. One of the most primitive differences in humans is the differentiation between men and women. Many literary works delve into the components of the opposing sexes, such as The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, which explores the world of gender roles and how they affect individuals, as well as society as a whole. This exploration takes place in a distorted, but not unrealistic, prospective world. In the modern dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood utilizes symbolism, theme, and tone to portray how the current objectification of women in our culture will inevitably lead toward a totalitarian
In The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood warns the reader that freedoms enjoyed by today’s society have enemies, and that they can easily be, have, and are being taken away. The original writing on the palimpsest can easily be scraped away, but live on underneath the surface, undermining the new message. Again and again, Atwood reveals that freedom and the desire for freedom—over sexuality, autonomy, and life and death—cannot be erased. Human beings, in Atwood’s conception, thrive on freedom of love, intimacy, and death, and no amount of social control or authoritarian rule can totally undermine human attempts to live fully. All Gilead’s authoritarian controls fall in one way or another by the end of the novel. Gilead sets out to fulfill impossible goals by stamping out whole swathes of human nature, and, inevitably, fails.
The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood, is a criticism and embroidery of contemporary issues regarding patriarchal, hierarchical, and religious fundamentalist developments in history and the present. The Handmaid's Tale is often likened to eminent dystopian novels such as George Orwell's 1984 and Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Feminist literary criticism employs feminist principles to explore "... the ways in which literature… reinforce or undermine the economic, political, social, and psychological oppression of women"(Tyson). Analyzing the dystopian novel through the feminist lens, the reader can observe Atwood's portrayal of the relationships between the sexes, the roles they are expected to play, and the definition of masculinity and
The Handmaid's Tale presents an extreme example of sexism and misogyny by featuring the complete objectification of women in the society of Gilead. Yet by also highlighting the mistreatment of women in the cultures that precede and follow the Gileadean era, Margaret Atwood is suggesting that sexism and misogyny are deeply embedded in any society and that serious and deliberate attention must be given to these forms of discrimination in order to eliminate them.
An important issue in today’s society is the gender inequality of men and women in the labor force. There are many different aspects that add to this issue as a whole, two of the most important ones including the differences in wages of men and women, and the view that women should stay at home and raise their children. The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood, provides an interesting view on this subject, showing what would happen if this issue was left untouched through a world ruled by men. Although this issue has been addressed in some ways in the past, there are many unturned stones where improvements should be made to ensure an equilibrium in men 's respect for women, and vice versa.