Full list of key quotes from Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale and Shelley's Frankenstein. Includes technical analysis of each quote. Ideal for exam revision for the Edexcel Pearson English Literature A-level.
The Totalitarian aspects of Gilead mean that people in society, particularly women, are
denied individualism and emotion. The women aren’t allowed to love who they want to love
or even have their own name.
Gileadean society acts under the principle of utilitarianism.
In order for Gilead to fix its birth rate they should take a more scientific approach, they take
a biblical approach and waste many fertile handmaids on infertile commanders.
Work on the basis of statistics, ignoring human emotion which ultimately prevails
‘Doubled’
Offred describes her and Ofglen as ‘doubled’. Both women lack uniqueness, they have become
clones of the system and have been forced to conceal their true identities, opinions and even names.
This generates connotations not only of their identical physical appearance in matching red, but also
their roles and behaviours. A lack of identity has a detrimental effect on mental wellbeing on the
narrator as she is forced to revert to memories to remember who she is.
This links to Frankenstein as Shelley also uses doubles in order to suggest issues within society, as
Walton and Victor are doubled in their dangerous ambition.
’My name isn’t Offred, I have another name, which nobody uses now because it’s forbidden’
‘I tell him my real name, and feel that therefore I am known. I act like a dunce. I should
know better. I make of him an idol, a cardboard cut-out.
Her real name is of great significance to her. The name that Gilead assigns her makes her merely the
property of a man hence the use of the patronym ‘Offred’ in which the suffix of ‘Fred’ takes on the
, name of the commander, so the male has possession even within the name. Here Atwood highly
stresses the importance of individualism in the form of identity. The use of narrative technique is
vital here as the reader is able to empathise with the speaker’s lack of identity. Telling Nick her name
makes her feel exposed as it is the only part of her which is not exploited.
The creature is also nameless, which results in him questioning the purpose of his existence and his
identity.
Sinking my hands into that soft resistant warmth which is so much like flesh’
This simile personifies the bread, making it sound ‘like flesh’. The need for physical human contact
suggests the loneliness and isolation felt by the narrator. With the use of adjectives ‘soft’ to amplify
the memory of tactile sensation.
The creature has a need for companionship and contact, or love found in any form. Both Offred and
the Creature are arguably isolated due to their appearance, as Offred’s red dress is designed to repel
the affections of others, just as the creature’s unpleasant appearance is.
‘Nobody dies from lack of sex. It’s lack of love you die from’
What Gilead is missing from society is love, which is the ultimate flaw of this theocracy. Women
have sex only for reproductive purposes only; there is no enjoyment as there is no love. Atwood
suggests the importance of emotion on human behaviour, a theocracy such as Gilead would never
be successful as people cannot live without love.
Victor also makes the mistake of bringing a creature into the world without the element of love,
which ultimately results in the creation of a monstrous being. Just as the creation of a society
without love results in a monstrous society.
‘I feel like the word shattered. I want to be with someone’.
The layout of sentences in this case is very interesting; to feel like the sound of glass, is to feel
hollow, to feel sharp and untouchable. Equally, the strange idea of feeling like a verb, describing
herself as feeling like the verb ‘shattered’, shows a manipulation of language; it is almost a simile to
describe herself as like a word itself, however it could equally just be used as a verb to emphasise
the way she feels emotionally shattered- fragile like glass. The way Atwood follows this exclamation
with another short sentence, portrays how her loneliness makes her crave intimacy.
‘What else comes from such denial?’
When Offred kisses Nick, she recognises that this is the result of a society which prevents intimacy
and relationships on a physical level. She uses a rhetorical question ‘what else comes from such
denial?’ This sort of defeats the point of Gilead’s regime.
‘I am thirty-three years old. I have brown hair. I stand five seven without shoes. I have
trouble remembering what I used to look like. I have viable ovaries. I have one more
chance’
This self-identification shows that Offred is slowly forgetting the basic things that are important. She
repeats the present tense verb ‘Have’, with the pronoun ‘I’ in front, which keeps all of these facts
present and true in reality. The use of assonance shows that she is trying to maintain her sanity.
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