The Handmaid's Tale is told from the perspective of Offred, a Handmaid living in a dystopian society in an alternate world where the entire U.S government has been annihilated by a christian military group.In a series of flashbacks Offred explains that her world is a world in which the earth has been so polluted by radiation and other chemicals that women--and babies--are a precious commodity. This is what Offred is, she is a handmaid who has to sleep with the master of the house, or the Commander, as she calls him, in order to give birth to his babies. The Commanders have wives of course, but these wives can't procreate due to old age or because their husbands are sterile. The husbands would never admit they are sterile so instead they get a Handmaid to procreate with.
Offred was picked because she had given birth once before to her daughter. What? she had a daughter? Oh yes ladies and gentleman, she had a husband too. She does not know where her husband or her daughter is. Offred only remembers being taken away from them after they tried to run away. They got caught of course and Offred and her best friend Moira got sent to a type of academy where an Aunt teaches them how to behave in this new society as Handmaids. An Aunt has more rights then a regular woman. They are like nuns basically, with the Lord's power under their belt. Kind of like how women back in the day tried to trick men into giving them some power with the reasoning that they were pure since they went to church and were not in the secular environment.
Offred then explains that her best friend Moira escaped by impersonating one of the Aunts. Oh, then what were you doing Offred? You act like you don't have a child waiting for you out there crying for her mommy. You disgust me woman! Okay, rant over.
In the present, Offred is in her early thirties and the biological clock is ticking like a bomb because this is her last chance. The last chance she has of getting pregnant before she is declared an "Unwoman", a barren woman basically, and gets sent to The Colonies. The Colonies are where all the old or useless people are. There they are exposed to toxic radiation and are in charge of burning dead bodies. At worst Offred could become one of the dead bodies that they burn.
The Commander's is the third household she has been in and in my head I'm thinking, really? You've done this for three men already?
Offred sleeps with the Commander once a month. In this...what can I call it? Ritual, Offred holds the hand of the barren Commander's wife, Serena, while the Commander has sex with her like it is a chore.
In her miserable life, the only thing that Offred looks forward to is shopping. When she goes shopping she has to meet up with another Handmaid from another household who will make sure she does not do anything wrong, like read a book or a sign. Oh wait she can't , because the books are shut up tight for the men to read and the stores no longer have written signs, instead they have pictures for the little retarded woman who walk in the street because apparently their heads will explode if they read two words.
I give Offred some credit in that she doesn't look forward to the shopping as much as looking forward to leaving the house to go look at The Wall. The Wall is where they place dead bodies in order to warn the public against messing with Big Brother. Offred fears finding her husband, Luke, up on The Wall. Luke is never seen up on The Wall but readers never find out what happened to him either.
To make a long story short, Offred's luck changes when the Commander starts feeling lonely and hangs out with her in private. This is not allowed but they do it anyway. Offred, who has been looking for any sign of weakness pounces on this opportunity and asks him for some face cream in exchange for not telling on him. Women are not allowed such things as face cream because it causes extreme vanity. The Commander gives it to her but in exchange she has to do a dirty dirty thing...play scrabble. *Gasp*. This is the only instance Offred and I burst out laughing. Although, she laughed in her head while I was lucky enough to fall out of my chair clutching my stomach.
It does not stop with scrabble folks. Like the serpent with the apple, the Commander gives Offred a magazine to read and then her head exploded. But seriously, it was an old magazine like from the seventies. And her head didn't explode and there were no earthquakes or tsunamis. Anyway, Offred continues meeting with the Commander and at some point he lets her visit a whore house where she meets her friend Moira who became a prostitute in favor of becoming a Handmaid (she is a lesbian). She still has to sleep with men but at least she made a choice which is more then I can say about Offred.
I should mention that all Offred does is hate things from afar without actively doing anything to fix her situation. "I hate how they treat me. I hate the wife. She purposely holds my hand too tightly during the ritual because she hates me." This is not what she says verbatim but you get the idea. All she does is whine and this is not what I thought this book was about.
This book was recommended to me by a die hard feminist who said she loved it because it was about women gaining their agency back. After reading this book I strongly disagree. This book confirmed once again the reason women were subjugated since the beginning of time: All they do is wait for someone to make the sacrifice and stand up for them.
I am a woman and proud of it. I am not against equal rights. I am against hypocrisy and weakness. First of all this book is a disservice to all women. Maybe our subjugation could happen once because we knew of no other way, but it is ridiculous and disheartening that this author thinks it could happen again. Now that we have our freedom, I believe from the bottom of my heart that women would never let men tell them they could not read or have a job or a bank account. Yet, Atwood does a good job of drawing a parallel between her book and the struggle women went through in real life. Here is a quote from the book which eerily brought home the similarities between real life history and this book:
"You don't know what it's like, [Offred] said. I feel as if somebody cut off my feet." "It's
Only a job, [Luke] said, trying to soothe me...hush, he said...You know I'll take
care of you. I thought, already he's starting to patronize me." (p.179)
This touched me as it describes how it was the beginning of the end for women when the military group took over and started firing women from their jobs. Offred's bank account was frozen and I loved that she described this violation of her freedom as if her feet had been cut off because that is exactly what happened. This was the only part of the book where the author made me feel anything but disgust. This is the part where the women were supposed to fight, but it never happened. Oh, at the end we get some lackluster hope with an impending revolution that included men and women but there was no real resolution.
If the author's goal was to write a book that spoke of a woman's strength then this book was an epic fail. If the author's goal was to write a depressing book set in a dystopian society then she nailed it. Offred never gained her agency, all she did was try to find the commander's weakness and sleep with the gardener. The Commander's weakness was her potential suicide as the last Handmaid committed suicide and the Commander was traumatized. However, this is not really a weakness since she would only be bluffing since she does not want to die.
All she got from the gardener were a couple of orgasms, big whoop. I would have even preferred a small hope that she was capable of defining herself other than by a man by just telling us her name. Even identifying herself by her real name instead of the name they gave her would have been a small rebellion and something that I would have given her credit for. But just as the events that could have happened to make this book way better NEVER happened, Offred never did anything that did not make me wish they would throw her carcass into the fire already.
In conclusion, this book was a complete disappointment and the only thing I can give the author credit for is her technique in writing this book. I liked how the book was set up in flashbacks but I did not like how she wrote some historical notes in the back to let the reader know how this society started. This screams of laziness and also makes me question why she did not just incorporate the historical notes into the story. As for the plot and the message, they are a horrible disservice to the hard work of strong women everywhere who do stand up and take action. Women, who I assure you, would have come out guns blazing if men ever tried to subjugate them again. That this book was compared to the masterpiece that is 1984 also disgusts me. I hope that whatever panel decides when a book becomes a classic, in the future tries to look at other aspects other than the writing technique because this book needs its own bonfire.
Bottom Line
Read this if you want to be a well read person with an open mind who wants to seem intelligent when people ask you what you are reading. Also read this if you like depressing books about women. Do not read this if you hope to become empowered as a woman in the 21st century. Read Shabanu: Daughter of the Wind or anything else really.
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