A fundamentalist society (Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood)

Member Name: Ayesha-`

Product:	Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
Date:	05/10/07 (104 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Fascination, satirical story

Disadvantages: A bit far-fetched, weird

Story

I remember reading this book at the very start of my A-level in English Literature. When we first approached the book, we were told to buy it, bring it into school but not read it. To be honest, none of us really knew what a 'handmaid' was. So we came in, 20 odd students, & sat there wondering how the lesson would go, when we knew nothing of the story yet. The book starts out with a biblical reference, a quote & a proverb. I suppose this is meant to give you a vague idea of what the story is about, but for me I still felt pretty clueless. We read the very first chapter, of the first section, entitled 'Night'. It gave away little about the story as a whole, so we were asked to analyse just these two pages & discuss what we thought the story might be about.

From this chapter, it seems that a group of people have been imprisoned in a former gymnasium. They are being forced to live with strict rules & what sounds like the threat of violence or torture if they break them. You can sense that there has been a dramatic change in the place & life as we know is a thing of the past. I tend to quite like stories that are based on a complete change in society.

As the story goes on, we learn that our main character, Offred, has been moved to a house where she plays some specific role, but things seem a little more domesticated. Everyone has a specific dress code, with women wearing gowns of a particular colour, depending upon their status. Offred's gown is bright red. She has a low status, as a maid. But there are servants at this house already, her job is different. Offred & all the other occupants of this house, as well as the entire area known as Gilead are subject to strong surveillance & more strict rules that, if broken, could lead to death. People are completely trapped in their roles, & Offred's role is particularly disturbing.

A kind of war had broken out, like a rebellion against the permissiveness & immoralities of modern life. In Gilead, the rebellion had succeeded & our Offred, whose real name we never find out & who once had an ordinary life in the way that we know, with a partner & child, has been the victim of its effects. This story is focused on Offred, but also looks at how life changes for all the others involved, in particular, the females, but also the males. Even those who have been given the most superior statuses in Gilead find themselves subject to oppression in the new society.

Structure

The story is 324 pages long & it is broken down into 15 sections, with 46 chapters distributed among these sections plus another part. I cannot comment too much on the structure as it will spoil the book. It is best just to start reading it from page to page & you will appreciate it more that way. Because I was studying this book as part of a course, it took me a good couple of months to read the whole book. It is quite an easy read & can probably be digested within a few days. I don't recommend reading it all in one go, the sections are always there for a reason, anyway. If you can, try to read them one at a time. It keeps the suspense going & gives you time to really think about what you are reading.

Writing Style

The story is written in the first person & the present tense, something which I generally do not like in a book. However, once I had read further into the book, I started to get used to the writing style. I suppose Atwood had her reasons for writing in this way. I have read other books that use this technique & found them very hard to follow, but in this case, the language is kept very simple & although not colloquial, it is much like Offred is talking to you. I imagine it would make a very good audio book.

Atwood's descriptions are generally quite straightforward, with Offred telling us exactly what she sees. How she sees it is also quite simplistic, with no fancy language or exaggerations. In can, however, take a long time to really get into the story & understand what is happening, because it is really so weird. She also has a way of holding back on the full story, which makes you all the more keen to read on, but can get a bit frustrating after a while. The front cover of the book I have shows an illustration of a handmaid, presumably Offred, but the face is almost completely smudged out & the picture has a real vaguenss about it. I think this image does actually reflect the story as a whole, because you never really get to know everything about Offred, even though it is written from her perspective. You also never fully understand the society, just parts of it. There are plenty of mysteries in this book & much of that is down to her writing style. It does eventually start to make sense, but the book takes a lot of patience.

Satire

We read an article in our class about Atwood, visiting Afghanistan. Funnily enough, we read this book around the time Afghanistan was featuring on the news almost daily, with stories of war & a society of oppression. During the reign of the Taliban, women in Afghanistan, from a western perspective at least, had practically no freedom. The Taliban might have argued that the women there had freedom from promiscuity or immorality, but of course the way this freedom was granted was both cruel & incredibly restrictive. Women were to be covered completely, from head to toe with nothing more than a tiny mesh for the eyes to see. They could not laugh, go out without a male relative to escort them or work. Beatings & the death penalty would be the punishment for those that defied the laws.

Atwood's novel is her interpretation of how she imagined life would be if fundamental Christianity was used in the same way fundamental Islam was used in Afghanistan to transform society in the west. In fact what she is trying to show is that life would not be that different. Of course in fundamental Christianity there tends to be an emphasis on procreation - sex is not for pleasure but for bringing about new life. This is her basis for the new society that has become completely obsessed with taking all pleasure out of sex (& everything else, actually) regulating it & making the sheer function of the society to multiply.

The society is not hell, although it may seem it in comparison to the life we have now. In fact, Atwood also shows how the women, although forced into these roles, do find that freedom & value in not being drooled over or wolf-whistled at by men in the street. Suddenly a man will appreciate even to touch a woman's hand, because it is so forbidden, yet he daren't try.

There is a lot more I could talk about, because this story can really be evaluated from a number of angles., but hopefully this is enough to give you an idea of the kind of book it is. It gave us a lot to analyse in our classes & in fact I found it quite disturbing. It is hard to imagine a society like this ever really existing in the west, at this extreme, yet there is nothing to say it is not possible.

Overall

I found this book very interesting, although I did find it a bit extreme, I think this was the author's intention. The idea that life in the west could be turned completely upside-down & end out the way she describes, to me seems very unrealistic. I think, although I understand the purposes of the way roles are allocated & people talk in this book is meant to emphasise the change & how forced it is, it made the book seem too far-fetched for my liking. On the other hand, I enjoyed it for its thought-provoking qualities. Not exactly moving or tragic, but certainly very disturbing. I'd like to believe it would never really happen, but when the idea is raised, you can't help but feel a little uncomfortable thinking about it. If you like a good, thought-provoking book that goes beyond the boundaries of reality without being quite fantasy, this book is for you.

It might be more of interest to women, because of the issues it deals with - I know that the two males in our class did not like this book & felt awkward trying to study it, but at the same time I think they appreciated it for what it was. I'm not sure this book is aimed at a particular age group, but would say due to some explicit description it is not suitable for under 16s. You need to have a more mature approach for this book - & it is a serious kind, so it's not for those looking just for something amusing or fun. I would probably read it again just because I was fascinated by Atwood's ideas & because I am still baffled by the story & hoping for more answers to appear, but you might prefer just to borrow this from your local library, rather than buying a copy if you'd be happy to leave the mysteries as mysteries.

Summary: A glimpse of Atwood's view of the western world gone extremist