An thorough analysis of The Handmaid's Tale intended for English students and IB English language and literature students in particular. Includes an analysis of key themes, characters, historical context and quotes.
The handmaid's tale notes on Atwood's context - A STAR
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The University of Birmingham (UBir)
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The Handmaid's Tale Analysis IB English L+L
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● Opening: use of 5 senses- visuals of room, old gymnasium, scent of sweat, sounds of
music played during dances
○ Comment on modern society’s unquenchable thirst for more, never satisfied-
‘how did we learn it, that talent for insatiability?
○ Introduction to the idea that the setting is formerly US- use of US army blankets
○ Aunt Sarah and Elizabeth introduced, implication of age/experience
○ ‘we still had our bodies’- mindset of trading, bargaining to gain something, even if
it means exchanging your body- desperation
○ leaves us in a state of shock, suspenseful, bewilderment
○ we are made to feel a similar way Offred does in the beginnings
○ gives us the desire to read onward
● Closing:
○ by the time we reach the historical notes, we have heard Offred’s story for 300
pages, making us question the nature of the historical notes
○ a man reads out the notes- intentional decision, male perspective interpretation
of female narrative- irony
○ we feel our understanding is incomplete
○ ‘are there any questions?’- Atwood is telling us to ask questions of ourselves, our
world- our answers form our understanding of the text.
● Overarching narrative structure/imagery/genre stuff
○ Post modernism
■ Offred is undone, her thoughts spiral and she is left confused and
disorientated
■ ‘This is a reconstruction, all of it is a reconstruction’
■ Her fragmented thoughts and experiences make the reader disorientated
and confused as well
■ Fragmented narrative, cold open with ‘i want you to kiss me’ after
discussion of another theme
■ The moment with the commander is a recontruction, one in which we as
readers are unaware what is real
○ Imagery
■ animal imagery/metaphors
■ the commander walks towards offred in the night, as she is going
to her room
■ he walks past her after looking at her and leaves, which is against
the rules- he is not supposed to be in the hall at night
, ■ offred describes the encounter as ‘something that has been shown
to her’
■ the signals animals give one another: lowered blue eyelids, ears
laid back, raised hackles. a flash of bared teeth, what in hell does
he think he’s doing?
■ animalistic imagery is used to describe the handmaids during the
particicution- they are reduced to animals, to the evolutionary
desire for revenge and blood
■ Serena joy and flower imagery
■ Offred compares serena joy to a flower with withered genitalia, a
dispensable human who can no longer fulfil her reproductive or
evolutionary requirements
○ plants
■ garden
■ body
■ flowers
■ All feminine, perpetuation of the obsession with bodies and femininity and
what it can do for men
○ Genre:
■ dystopian fiction- female perspective, gives female voice power, rare in
dystopian genre and first of its kind
■ fictional autobiography (Offred’s autobiography)
■ contemporary fable- meant to teach us something, give us a philosophical
takeaway
■ Warns us (what will happen if ___) - link to Antigone
■ Hope- Gilead has fallen, we see this from the notes on the symposium,
the future is not Gilead
■ Written in a diary/letter format
■ Her testimony
○ context of novel and background of Offred
■ memory of her mother taking her to ‘see ducks’ when really it was a
gathering of radical feminists burning pornographic materials
■ feminist sex wars of the late 70s-early 80s (book published in 1986)
■ flashback to her being taken away from her mother, offred believing they’d
killed her
■ Offred’s mother is a polarised, radical feminist
■ Her friends often pushed her further towards the end of the political
spectrum, accusing her of being pro-natalist after having Offred
■ Being radical and polarised isolated her and left offred’s mother lonely
○ Biblical allusions
, ■ biblical sections used as propaganda.
■ Handmaid defined in old testament: a body at the service of the patriarchs
■ Gilead =real place mentioned in bible- presented as an ideal image for a
state run on patriarchal, fundamentalist principles.
○ Characterisation+ author’s choice: introduces characters then they go missing,
does not finish the narratives and their stories
● Female characters:
○ Offred:
■ Motif: doubles- she is always a doppelganger of the Offglen, doubled up
with Serena Joy when she goes to Jezebel’s. She sees herself reflected
in the women around her, they act as mirrors to what will happen if she
internalises the rhetoric
○ Moira:
■ never becomes a handmaid- never makes it to their ‘status’
■ another heroine in the novel, maintains her individuality
○ Serena Joy:
■ serene= biblical reference, joy= biblical reference
■ most powerful presence in Offred’s life
■ helped create the system that she now is oppressed by and that violates
her marriage
■ her femininity is fading, she is getting older- the ceremony (Offred being
inseminated by the commander)
○ Offred recognises her from television, she was on a gospel show for children
○ Serena joy and flower imagery
■ Offred compares serena joy to a flower with withered genitalia, a
dispensable human who can no longer fulfil her reproductive or
evolutionary requirements
○ ofwarren/janine:
■ traditional/conventional female victim- both pre- and post- Gilead
■ abused, neglected and rejected by the men in her life
■ appears, disappears and reappears again throughout the novel- every
appearance a different stage in the handmaid’s lifecycle/career
■ purpose as a character is to warn us what will happen if you give up hope,
stop fighting or never fight altogether
■ after her Gileadean duties are fulfilled, she no longer has any meaning or
purpose- she failed at the role that defined her and now is mentally
deteriorating
■ her story is that of the female victim- the trope of the female that acts as a
victim, as the unlucky one
■ her story is one of a loss of hope. what happens when you stop fighting,
stop compartmentalising, stop deflecting- can no longer resist the mental
anguish
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