Margaret Atwood Create A Dystopia In The Handmaid's Tale

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Dystopia Dystopia is defined as a fictional place that portraits future consequences of present problems, in which are unpleasant. This is an argument on changing the way people do things. The writer shows how poor things can get if changes are not made; therefore, it is used to persuade people to change their ways for the better of the future. Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale” is a dystopian novel, because the society goes against women. In this novel, women are not allowed to read, they are not allowed to write, if they are fertile they are forced into having sex to populate the Republic Gilead more, and the women are not allowed to be employed. During the time of Atwood writing this novel, there were three immense problems going on …show more content…

They have a minimal amount of rights. Even the most basic rights they could want, they do not have. An example showing how women are valued in the novel is when Atwood states, “ As if we are something he inherited, like a Victorian pump organ, and he has not figured out what to do with us. What we are worth” (88). This quote depicts how women are valued in The Republic of Gilead. They are looked at by high up men as a sex tool. If women are infertile, they are looked at as garbage and a waste. Women have no rights as shown in this quote when Atwood proclaims, “We can be read to from it, by him, but we cannot read” (88). This shows the very limited amount of rights that women have. They also receive almost no education, and are not allowed to be employed. Basically their only right is having the ability to reproduce with men, even though it is almost always forced when that …show more content…

Leading up to this time period, women worked hard to get equal rights and were doing well with it. For example, they got the right to vote, legal representation that was not just with their husbands, and control of their sexual reproduction; although, at 1985 they were not making any progress like they wanted to. To show an example of this, in the novel, Atwood states, “My name is not Offred, I have another name, which nobody uses now because it is forbidden. I tell myself it does not matter” (84). This shows an example that feminism is not where it wanted to be in 1985; however, it was not that bad in 1985. In 1985, feminism was stalled. There was no steps in the right direction and problems that still needed handled. Women did keep working to find out ways to fix problems like these in The United

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