on
3.5/5
Non-Fiction
- Get link
- Other Apps
Re-read technically.
Rating: 4.5/5
Pages: 311
Started: 3 October 2023
Finished: 6 October 2023
Summary:
In the dystopian society of Gilead, Offred is a Handmaid, assigned to a Commander to act as a concubine and servant in his household. As she gains a better understanding of the Commander and the various illegalities he gets away, she also recollects her transition from a liberated woman living in Massachusetts, to a trainee in the Red Center as her understanding of her purpose in the world was slowly altered, and finally to a Handmaid subject to all of Gilead's rules and restrictions--and subtly rebellious against the constriction.
Thoughts:
I distinctly remember being impressed by this book in 7th grade when I first read it, but that holds nothing to how impressed I am now. This book is utterly brilliant. The world-building is eerie and extensive and well-flushed and specific. The speed at which Atwood releases information is incredible; it is clear that she has a total mastery over language and storytelling. Her ability to weave present action together with past narrative is astounding; despite how unsettling the plot was--a man being torn apart by women a crime he didn't even commit, women giving birth in the midst of an utterly cultish ceremony?--this book was such a treat to read.
Paragraphs:
Just as in the Bible animals were often selected and murdered as an offering to God, so Offred has been chosen by The Republic of Gilead and offered up for reproduction. Remembering her time at the Red Center, Offred recalls that Aunt Lydia told the girls that “for our purposes, your feet and your hands are not essential” (91). Unharmed and unhindered feet are the simplest symbol of mobility, and hands, with opposable thumbs that allow for fine motor control such as using tools or writing, are integral to a person’s humanity and autonomy. The uselessness of these parts in the eyes of Gilead, which is here represented by Aunt Lydia, suggests that the women in the Republic are akin to animals, useful not for their humanity but for a specific biological function of their bodies. The actual act of sacrifice is best suggested, however, through the Ceremony: “I lie on my back, fully clothed except for the healthy white cotton underdrawers [...] Above me, toward the head of the bed, Serena Joy is arranged, outspread. Her legs are apart, I lie between them, my head on her stomach [...] Therefore I lie still and picture the unseen canopy over my head. I remember Queen Victoria’s advice to her daughter: Close your eyes and think of England” (93-94). This scene is incredibly ritualistic, with specific, stiff, awkward positioning of the characters. A figure lying on their back is offering up the most vulnerable side—their stomach, so Offred’s position is already reminiscent of sacrifice in that. Her laying on Serena Joy is ritualistic; Serena is essentially restraining her in the same way one might restrain an animal being taken to slaughter. Finally, Offred’s own submission to the sex is her own reluctant sacrifice of herself. She is not enjoying herself, just as Queen Victoria’s daughter didn’t, but she still “lie[s] still” and allows the process to happen, all in the hope of being impregnated.
The process of giving birth is one of the most primal, personal things a person can do, and so Gilead’s influence over the birthing process is an ultimate intrusion into the mother’s self. During Janine’s birth, Offred describes that “two others lead Janine to the Birthing Stool, where she sits on the lower of the two seats. She’s calmer now [The Commander’s Wife] scrambles onto the Birthing Stool, sits on the seat behind and above Janin, so that Janine is framed by her” (125). During a birth, the mother and the baby should be the most important people, yet here, according to the Gilead birthing process rules, Janine is seated below the Commander’s wife, and thus in a position of symbolic inferiority. Furthermore, her being held by the Commander’s Wife is a form of confinement, and thus a Gilead-sanctioned confiscation of autonomy—Gilead takes control over even the intimate process of giving birth. This Gilead-enforced disruption of the natural process of birth is reinforced by the baby’s naming. Usually the mother, the priority, the person who grew and expelled the child, is the one who decides its name, yet Gilead has decreed that “it’s the Wives who do the naming around here” (126). Just like with the physical positioning within the Birthing Chair, Gilead takes power away from the mother and gives it to the Commander’s Wife, asserting control over what should be a deeply intimate and internal proecess for the mother. Ultimately, this forced procedure of birth is a transgressive application of Gilead’s power over a woman and her internal biological processes.
Before (and outside of) Gilead’s reign, people had the freedom to do whatever they wanted. A harmless manifestation of this is exemplified by the Japanese tourists that visit Gilead: “The women teeter on their spiked feet as if on stilts, but off balance; their backs arched at the waist, thrusting their buttocks out. Their heads are uncovered and their hair too is exposed, in all its darkness and sexuality. They wear lipstick, red, outlining the damp cavities of their mouths” (28). Unlike the women living under Gilead’s regime, these tourists have the freedom to wear whatever clothes they want. They are not forced into the modesty of covering head or hair, and they are allowed to express sexuality through high heels and red lipstick. However Offred’s description of the Japanese women’s attire makes it seem miserable—teetering is an undignified and uncomfortable action, and the description of lipstick highlighting “ the damp cavities of their mouths” is gross and undignified. Offred, previously a member of a society that prised fashion such as this, has clearly been heavily influenced by Gilead’s forced repression. However, the admittedly genuine danger of freedom to is shown in Offred’s recollection of the time before Gilead: “Don’t stop on the road to help a motorist pretending to be in trouble. Keep the locks on and keep going. If anyone whistles, don’t turn to look. Don’t go into a laundromat, by yourself, at night” (24). Women were not safe in society; even in mundane situations like the laundromat or trying to help someone whose car broke down, they were under constant threat. The mundanity of where the threats against women could take place is a perfect example of just how dangerous the freedom to has the potential to be. By contrast, the freedom from seems safe and protective “Now we walk along the same street, in red pairs, and no man shouts obscenities at us, speaks to us, touches us. No one whistles” (24). Under Gilead’s totalitarian regime, where citizens who break the rules are taken away, tortured, and killed, Offred has the freedom from worrying about strangers harassing or sexually assaulting her—the danger of society towards women has, in that respect, been tamed. However, this freedom from danger goes hand in hand with the freedom from choice, something that is central to Gilead’s structure. By taking away people’s autonomy, Gilead is able to create a “perfect” society, one where things run smoothly, lubricated by compliance. This is best exemplified by Jeanine’s compliance during her birth: The Commander’s Wife “scrambles onto the Birthing Stool, sits on the seat behind and above Janine, so that Janine is framed by her” (125). No woman going through the process of giving birth would want to be held by a practically unknown woman of a higher class, and yet Janine does, because that is the way things are done under Gilead’s regime. She has no autonomy, no freedom to choose how her own body is used. Though on the surface, Gilead’s totalitarian gift to its citizens of freedom from the threat of harm seems far better than the freedom to assault and harm that people had in the past, it becomes clear that the freedom from choice—the freedom from autonomy—is also horrifying and dangerous.
The society of Gilead is defined by its sexual repression; a man like Nick cannot even make eye contact in public with a Handmaid “clutch[ing] the sky-blue cape tightly around” her, an extremely modest outfit held tightly in place, without “jeopardizing” his job and possibly his life (232). By contrast, the hotel that Offred and The Commander visit is a place of debauchery and high-profile promiscuity. Part of the way through their night, Offred comments that The Commander “could have called over a waitress, there are some of them, in identical black miniskirts with pompoms on their breasts” (238). Especially compared to the modest outfits that the proper women of Gilead must wear, the waitresses are dressed in absurdly sexual costumes, with features such as the pompoms actively drawing attention to body parts that are considered private and tempting by Gilead. Thus the scene overtly presents the women as objects of desire, promiscuously available to the men at any time. The near hyperbolous sexualization at the hotel is emphasized by Moira’s description of how those who run the hotel see sexual activity within its walls: ‘Let, hell, they encourage it [sex between women]. Know what they call this place among themselves? Jezebel’s. The aunts figure we’re all damned anyway” (249). The biblical figure of Jezebel is one of vicious feminine destruction and devil worship; the more modern Jezebel archetype is characterized, according to Time magazine, as “promiscuous, greedy, and godless.” In contrast to the repressed and controlled sexuality expected in Gilead, the hotel is truly to their society what Jezebel was to the bible—an example of promiscuity, sexuality, greed, and sin. And yet the high-ranking men in Gilead— “officers [...] and senior officials. And trade delegations” have unfettered access to all the hotel offers (237). In Gilead, all must follow the rules, must live chaste and repressed and proper lives—except for the rich men, the powerful men, the men who wrote the rules that the citizens of Gilead have to follow, have the liberty to enjoy practically obscene sexual freedom. This irony is an excellent example of the unfair exceptions and hypocrisy that people in power feel entitled to.