1ST 3 SECTIONS CONTENTS

'a palimpsest'

'old sex in the room and loneliness'

'they've removed anything you could tie a rope to'

'I know why there is no glass...why the window opens partly and why the glass is shatter proof'

'thinking can hurt your chances, and I intend to last'

'those other escapes, the ones you can open in on yourself'

'the circumstances have been reduced, for those of us who still have circumstances'

'where I am is not a prison but a privilege, as Aunt Lydia said'

'Time here is measured by bells'

'as in a nunnery too, there are few mirrors'

'the colour of blood which defines us'

'there remains a mirror...I can see as I go downstairs, round, convex, like the eye of a fish'

'black for the Commander; blue for the Commander's Wife'

'Martha's dress which is dull green'

'it's the red dress she disapproves of, and what it stands for'

'they're doing it for us all, said Cora'

'Better her than me, Rita said'

'as if the voice itself were a traveller...How I used to despise such talk. Now I long for it...an exchange of some sorts'

the Marthas are not supposed to fraternize with us'

'willow, weeping catkins'

'a darker crimson towards the stem .. cut and beginning to heal'

'the garden is the domain of the Commander's Wife'

'knitting scarves for the Angels at the front lines'

'maybe it's something to give them purpose'

'I am a reproach to her, and a necessity'

'things haven't settled down...unsure of our status'

'Yours is a position of honour'

'try to think of it from their point of view... it isn't easy for them'

'she then was a women who might bend the rules'

'like a business transaction'

'I wanted her to turn into an older sister, a motherly figure'

'My husband...till death do us part'

'they can hit us, there's Scriptural precedent'

THEOCRACY

SURVEILLANCE

SERENA JOY

MATRIARCHY

ROLES IN SOCIETY

PAST VS PRESENT

'The car is a very expensive one, a Whirlwind; better than the Chariot, much better than the chunky, practical Behemoth'

'he's just taken a risk, but for what?...Perhaps he is an Eye'

'Blessed be the Fruit...May the Lord open...Praise be'

'We aren't allowed to go there except in twos'

'the young ones are often the most fanatical'

REBELLION

'I think of placing my hand on it...a small defiance of rule'

'the rewards I hold out for...tiny peep holes'

'What if I were to come at night...and permit him beyond my white wings?'

'the windows of the vans are dark tinted and the men wear glasses: a double obscurity'

'aren't yet permitted to touch women'

'passive but there'

'they have no outlets now except themselves, and that's a sacrilege'

CONTROL

'I move my hips a little'

'the street is almost like a museum'

'The Republic of Gilead, said Aunt Lydia, knows no bounds. Gilead is within you'

'women were not protected then'

'Freedom to and freedom from. in the days of anarchy, you were given freedom to. Now you are given freedom from'

AUNT LYDIA

'We were a society dying of too much choice'

WAR

'war cannot intrude except on television'

'Ever since Central America was lost to Libertheos, oranges have been hard to get'

'she's an object of envy and desire..."show off"'

'the pregnant woman's belly is like a huge fruit'

'all children are wanted nowadays'

'It's been a while since I've seen skirts that short on women'

WOMEN, FERTILITY AND SEXUALITY

'their hair is too exposed in all its darkness and sexuality'

'westernised, they used to call it'

'I used to dress like that. That was freedom'

'Modesty is invisibility'

'To be seen is to be penetrated...you must be impenetrable'

'yes we are very happy...what else can I say?'

[Ofglen] 'whose every act is done for show'

[to escape] 'is next to impossible'

THE WALL

'we're supposed to look'

'like dolls...scarecrows...flour or dough'

'the heads are zero...like snowmen

'no woman in her right mind, these days, would seek to prevent a birth, should she be so lucky as to conceive'

'these bodies on the Wall are Time Travellers, anachronisms. They're come from the past

'it will become ordinary'

A feminist interprets this as repression of women through religion and Biblical precedents; a transgression into the traditional domesticated roles of women adopted throughout history

Link this to the Moral Majority, and the religious rule of Reagan of the 80s, 'renewal of traditional values which have been the bedrock of America's greatness'

Feminist theory emphasises the significance of a female network; it can be used as a source of comfort (i.e. Cora and Rita and Offred's desire to engage in trivial conversation), or as a source of matriarchal misogyny, pitting the Wives against the Handmaids

WR: Conversely, religion is used as a means of empowerment of the female population in The Power, so despite there being a polarity between THT and The Power, it shows the influence that religion has in exerting power

Reminiscent of Phyllis Schlafly, pro-family, contributed to the over-writing of ERA

Panopticon: internal surveillance, enhanced by the matriarchal conflict between the Wives and Handmaid's

MARXIST THEORY: 'RELIGION IS THE OPIUM OF THE MASSES'

One of the examples of how dystopia is a genre of fear

HOWELL:Individual freedom of choice has been outlawed, and everyone has been drafted into the service of the state'

HOWELL: Atwood's concern for basic human rights are plain here'

WISKER: There is no sisterhood, only division and disempowerment'

HUNTER: Atwood's focus is on the extent to which the individual can push the limits of social determinism

NEWMAN: Women are dictated by biological determinism and misogyny

PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER: Provides a compelling lesson in power politics and in reasonable intentions gone hysteric

Link to the infertility hysteria in America in the 1980s: Doctors blamed the events on 'liberalised sexual attitudes, media presented careers as a cause for sterility, and it pressurised women back into domesticated roles

GOTTLIEB: Since the regime denies free will, the central character cannot be made responsible for their own ultimate failure in a repressive system that overpowers individuals

STOKWISZ: language is highlighted as the main instrument of ideological and social control