1. Finish A Handmaid's Tale, and post a comment here in which you point to one or two specific passages and reflect on what you see going on in them. What do you notice? What interests you? What questions do you have? How does the passage connect for you with the rest of the book? etc.
2. Write a 1-2 short paper about the novel in which you build on your thoughts in your comment here. Bring a hard copy to class.
While looking back at "The Handmaid's Tale," I noticed many connections with this text and the text of "1984." The lack of intimate relationships plays a major role in both pieces of literature. "The Handmaid's Tale" has the main character as the narrator which gives the reader direct insight on how they're feeling about their place in society. It is clear that Offred is really missing her husband and daughter and longs for an intimate relationship, even if it is with Nick, not Luke. While the reader also gets insight on Winston's feelings on his isolation, he did not have any strong relationships before The Party took over, thus the reader does not understand how lonely the society really is. While reflecting on how she feels about being with Nick, Offred questions whether she is betraying Luke. She remarks, "I would like to be without shame. I would like to be shameless. I would like to be ignorant. Then I would not know how ignorant I was" (263). Winston is in this position because he does not have any successful relationships from his past life that would make him feel guilty about being with Julia.
ReplyDeleteThis makes me think of that saying, "it's better to have love and lost than to never have loved at all"
A passage that stood out to me was the last sentence of chapter 6. In this passage Offred is looking at the hanging bodies of people who have been executed. As she is looking at the horrible sight she remembers what Aunt Lydia said to her about Gilead becoming “ordinary”. “Ordinary...is what you are used to. This may not seem ordinary to you now, but after a time it will. It will become ordinary.” (33) This quote exemplifies the dangers of a totalitarian fascist regime. Gilead tells its people that what the government is doing is correct until everyone is completely convinced. The government is slowly taking away its citizen’s human nature until everyone becomes so used to it that it becomes ordinary. This quote also instantly reminded me of 1984, another book where a totalitarian government convinces people that the un-ordinary is ordinary. Both of these books are similar in that they act almost as warnings against governments with too much power.
ReplyDeleteThe last section of The Handmaid's Tale, the "Historical Notes" chapter, completely changed my view of the novel. Up until that point, I had perceived the book as being about the Republic of Gilead, an evil and oppressive totalitarian regime, strictly controlling the lives of its citizens. Throughout the book, I had sympathized with Offred for all the suffering and distress she had faced. However, the epilogue changed this perception for me. It takes place in a lecture which explains and analyzes the basic concepts of Gilead. The professor says, "Gileadean society was under a good deal of pressure, demographic and otherwise, and was subject to factors from which we ourselves are happily more free. Our job is not to censure, but to understand" (302). To me, it seems ironic that after empathizing with Offred, the novel asks us to not judge the Gileadean society for its oppressive tactics. The lecture also brings humor and amusement to the story of Gilead and Offred, as evidenced in the jokes of the professor and laughter of the audience. I think that this belittles Offred's story into a simple historical document, and underestimates the torment and suffering she went through. Overall, I found the "Historical Notes" section to be informational because it cleared up any ambiguity in the novel, but also disconcerting because of its downplaying of Offred's tale.
ReplyDeleteThe passage at the end of page 182 was very interesting to me. It describes Offred’s feelings towards Luke during the night when she loses her job, because the government suddenly decided to take the rights of women away. She doesn’t just lose her job, she loses practically all of her freedom. She is with Luke, and because she suddenly realizes that she doesn’t exist as an individual in society, she feels empty. She doesn’t even feel right kissing her own husband.
ReplyDeleteHer and Luke can’t even hold onto the idea that they still have each other, because technically she cannot possess anything. He only has her; she doesn’t have him. “He doesn’t mind this, I thought. He doesn’t mind it at all. Maybe he even likes it. We are not each other’s, anymore. Instead, I am his” (182).
The interesting point of the passage is at the end when Offred, speaking to herself, questions Luke. She asks “Was I right? Because we never talked about it. By the time I could have done that, I was afraid to. I couldn’t afford to lose you” (182).
It seems like Atwood paints a portrait of men who only want to dominate women and use them as property for things like sex. Offred feels so insecure about the motives of men that she even questions her own husband’s motives. She fears that he might like the idea that she is his, and he is not hers. The women are stripped of all individuality, and they need to have sex in order to have babies, unless they want to die.
"I take the chicken, wrapped in butcher's paper and trussed with string. Not many things are plastic, anymore. I remember those endless white plastic shopping bags, from the supermarket; I hated to waste them and would stuff them in under the sink, until the day would come when there would be too many and I would open the cupboard door and they would bulge out, sliding over the floor. Lake used to complain about it. Periodically he would take all the bags and throw them out" (27).
ReplyDeleteThe passage I chose really caught my attention. Not only was Offred reminiscing on how her household used to run, but this passage also made me think of my mother and grandmother, the two central figures in the house as I grew up. This passage just took me back to my childhood, in which my mother was huge on recycling plastic shopping bags. Every morning, on my way out of the house I would grab my bagged lunch and head to catch the bus. Not very deep, I know, but as soon as I read the passage it just took me back in time.
On page 195, Offred talks about the Red Center. Temptation there was “anything more than eating and sleeping.” The possession of knowledge, as a thing itself, was temptation. “What you don’t know won’t tempt you”. I am particularly struck by this concept of temptation because Offred describes it here as in the Center. As if there was more to tempt her there, than in her Commander’s house with his books and his blackmarket feather costumes. I think Offred is tempted by knowledge, even when she is already in possession of it. She can do anything she likes with it, but she remains conscious of her self-preservation. When she learns that her shopping partner is somehow thinking outside the limits imposed upon her by the Gileadian system, Offred is tempted to remain aloof and pious and rest upon her image of being aloof and pious in the face of the temptation offered by knowing. Offred could pretend not to be of the same mind, and keep that knowledge somehow more sacred by not acting on it. She submits to temptation, she continues riskily going back to Nick, but she is aware of the fact that her knowledge tempts her just as much. She knows more of what is happening in her society than she did in the beginning of the novel. That acquired information still taunts her, even as she submits to her own desires and goes back to him again and again.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading this book I can't help but compare it to Orwell's 1984. One passage I found strikingly similar to 1984 is when Aunt Lydia states, "Ordinary is what you are used to too. This may not seem ordinary to you know, but after a time it will. It will become ordinary." (33) For me, this is very similar to Winston's conversation about reality with O'Brien. In both cases the characters are being told what to think.Reality and what is ordinary are usually two things a group of people can agree on. However, in these two novels concepts such as these are created by the people who make the rules.
ReplyDeleteAnother passage I found interesting was the passage where Janine is blamed for being raped. It is like the women are brainwashed and forced to believe that any harm that comes from sex is their fault. In this book women are simply tools in order to make a baby. There is no emotion in having sex which once again is similar to 1984.
A passage that stood out to me was from page 236 when the Commander takes Offred to the "club": "It occurs to me he is showing off. He is showing me off, to them, and they understand that, they are decorous enough, they keep their hands to themselves, but they review my breasts, my legs, as if there's no reason why they wouldn't. But also he is showing off to me. He is demonstrating, to me, his mastery of the world." I thought that this passage was just very disturbing because the women are being so blatantly objectified and showcased. It's like the commanders are at a trade show showing off their collections of women and comparing them and ogling them. Also the fact that he is showing off to her is concerning as well. Before when he and Offred were meeting up and playing scrabble, he was treating her as more of an equal. But at the club, he is showing off his power, showing Offred that he is still the more dominant one and has control over her. The whole time Offred is concerned about seeming nervous or awkward because it would embarrass him, which just goes to show how much power he has over her. Even though she is in a ridiculous costume, she feels embarrassed for him and not herself. This passage just really emphasizes the unequal balance of power between men and women.
ReplyDeleteThis passage is very long and starts on page 194 till 195. It is the moment where Offred is at the Prayvaganza and uses this time to craft her own personal version of the Lord's Prayer
ReplyDelete"My God. Who Art in the Kingdom of Heaven, which is within. i wish you would tell me Your Name, the real one I mean........I wish You'd answer. I feel so alone."
This passage struck me while reading because going to Sunday school all my life and having to memorize this prayer, it was interesting to see her twist on it. She related it to her current situation and I am curious as to whether she believes in the prayer or is just doing it because it is expected of her? No other portion of the novel does she express any genuine religious emotion. As the book is filled with religious symbols and language this passage shows a more intimate relationship with God. Offred personalizes her prayer and it is as if she is literally talking to. God. In all the other places where religions is used, for example in the greetings, the language is very robotic and there is no real feeling. After the prayer, in which she brings up a desire to know God, the idea of suicide, and her slowly dying hope, she says that she feels as if she is talking to a wall. Her last line of the prayer "Oh God oh God. How can I keep on living?" shows the agony and misery of her current state
“Sometimes the movie she showed would be an old porno film...Women kneeling, sucking penises or guns, women tied up or chaned or with dog collars around their necks, women hanging from trees....Once we had to watch a women be slowly cut into pieces... “Consider the alternatives. You see what things used to be like?””(118).
ReplyDeleteI would say this rates up in the top five most absurd passages in this book. What a way for the Aunts to downplay the oppression that exists in the society of Gilead. Regardless of whether the movies were real or not, the government felt it was necessary to create this picture of the past for the handmaids. It shows that they would to extremes of this sort in order to get the handmaids to “appreciate” the situation they are in. In order to control their frustration with their style of living, and prevent an uprising against the government of Gilead.
"I used to think of my body as an instrument, of pleasure, or a means of transportation, or an implement for the accomplishment of my will. I could use it to run, push buttons, of one sort or another make things happen. There were limits, but my body was nevertheless lithe, single, solid, one with me. Now the flesh arranges itself differently. I'm a cloud, congealed around a central object, the shape of a pear, which is hard and more real than I am and glows red within it translucent wrapping." -page 74,75
ReplyDeleteOffred explains the transformation of her own personal reflection of herself in this passage. It amazes me to think of the amount of power that societal changes have on individuals. In her previous life, Offred, was encouraged by society to embrace and cherish individualism. However as she reflects above, she no longer feels any attachment to her own body which is frightening in and of itself. As the novel progresses it is interesting to follow Offred's personal thoughts and reflections because it is a chance for the reader to get an inside look on how this rigid society effects individuals.