The Handmaid's Tale

Five stars for Atwood's writing, but I can't say I really enjoyed re-reading this.

I first read The Handmaid's Tale in college. We were assigned it in an English class called Propaganda & Rhetoric. I was an advertising major, and yet I hated that class.

I need to look and see if I still have any notes or essays from it though, because I'm curious now what Past Allie thought of this book. I don't remember. I don't remember being as disturbed by it then as I was during this reading. (And that's not even because of hysterics like IT COULD HAPPEN HERE or SCARY IN THIS POLITICAL CLIMATE, etc., because frankly, it did have some gaping holes.)

EDIT: I found a short essay I wrote during that semester. Damn, College Allie, you did not GET this book AT ALL. You did not GET how harrowing an experience this would have been, or how easily humans can betray and hurt and destroy each other, in the name of religion, in order to save your own skin, or for no reason at all. You had no concept of feminism or the history of fighting for basic human rights. Talking about joy and victory in Offred's story?! SERIOUSLY?? You were so naive, it's frankly embarrassing.

I wonder if I took that class today how I would feel about it. I am now doubting the things I remember hating about it, because clearly College Allie was an idiot.

This is a really good book and I think you should read it because we take a lot of freedoms for granted but it also shows that there is always more to be done when it comes to feminism.

Wow.

An interesting tale that indeed seems to be a prescient picture of our possible near future, given our political present.

Very scary given our world today ... and very well done.

Really great. I've meant to read this for a long time, but was prompted to finally start it by the release of the Hulu series and the associated press. It's very readable, fascinating, and utterly horrifying, not least because it isn't all that hard to see the seeds of such a future being sown, far more now than in 1985 when it was originally published. (Goodreads says 1998. Goodreads is wrong.)

Everything I can say about it is trite and has been said before. It is a classic and a warning and it is very much worth your time.

Terrifying and all too real

This was the fifth time I've read The Handmaid's Tale, and it continues to be as gripping on its fifth read as it was on its first. Atwood is an absolute master, and her portrayal of a future oppressive patriarchal society feels eerily like the future we are carving for ourselves. One of the great works of contemporary literature.

The audiobook version is exceptional; Claire Danes is the perfect narrator: direct, full of foreboding without melodrama, not overly emotional. The impact of her performance made me appreciate the book more.

I read “The Handmaid's Tale” in sixth form back in 2001-2002, and at the time it was a bit shocking, particularly one scene fairly early on in the book. One of the novel's key themes is power - who has it and who doesn't, and ultimately what we do with it is the most frightening thing proposed in the novel.

Roll the clock forward fifteen years and now things in the twenty first century have possibly taken a step backwards, with some parts of the first world now putting things into place which clearly remind me of a possible blossoming of Gileadean society.

Every little bit as powerful, shocking and frightening as it was back when it was published in the mid 1980s, “The Handmaid's Tale” is a word of warning to us all.

started shit, ended up being good. i'm too optimistic for this dystopian stuff.

I picked this up since it was announced that a TV series based on this book will be released soon on HULU, and that it was more timely than ever. I avoided reading it before because, to be frank, I didn't want to hear a gruesome tale about women being marginalized and abused. But I'm glad I did. This story is important on many levels. It shows the damage that men suffer when they cannot have balanced relationships with women, or open relationships (friendships or otherwise) with other men. It shows how subtly authoritarian regimes will creep up on well meaning, law abiding citizens. It shows how our reliance on computerized banking can be used against us. It shows how superficial beliefs about “nature” can be used to oppress others. And it carries the warning that change only amplifies with each new generation.

I love the way that this was broken into so many parts yet was a beautiful whole well done!

Now I understand what people are referring to when they say that this administration is trying to bring about The Handmaid's Tale. I feel for Offred as she now is unable to have her own life and she tries to push the boundaries wherever she can. The ending feels a bit abrupt and a little unsatisfying. She is talking about how she probably got a bit reckless because of some special treatment she was getting but all we know is she either got caught and removed, or was brought underground and maybe she escaped.

What is a bit more disturbing is the description of the events that led to the suspension of the US Constitution and the creation of Gilead. It feels a little too close to home right now as some are clearly itching for this catalyst to occur.

Topical reread considering real-world political (+environmental) developments. Absolutely held up. Still scary.

I stumbled upon this book without even knowing how old it was or what genre it belonged to. It had me hooked from Page 1 due to the awesome imagination that the words invoked it me. I could visualize this world where women are not individuals anymore but just baby producing machines. These handmaids are not even allowed to read. The fact that other childless women were complicit in this scared the hell out of me. The story here also furthers the thought that under a theocratic regime, it's always the women whose rights are taken away first. The way religious fanaticism is spreading across the world today, who knows what the future will bring.

Picked this up on a whim because I wanted to read it before watching the series on Hulu. If I'd read it before, it would have been just another dystopian tale; but, given the way things are in the States these days, it feels prophetic and is absolutely terrifying.

Docked a star for the writing style. I know everyone's got their own and I should probably be more appreciative, but it just didn't suit me. So many commas...

Finally read this “modern classic” and I'm glad I did. It's not a pleasant read, but it's engrossing and terrifying. Plenty of food for thought about reproductive rights, freedom, and desire here.

Scintillating, if not terrifying, read. As a woman, especially in a post-Trump victory America, the book is absolutely chilling and clearly just as resonant today as it was 20 years ago. Atwood explores (beautifully, I should note) a totalitarian, patriarchal New England in which women are relegated into singular spheres of domesticity. By splicing womankind into the different ways by which women have typically gained agency (the role of wife, the role of birthing, of home care, etc), and stripping them of any other means of gaining power, women are wholly reduced to meaningless lives devoid of love and purpose. I would recommend this book to any woman of any age as a means of contemplating women's historical, and future, place in our society, especially moving into a Trump America.

''But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve.''

Imagine: You are a woman, and you have no name. Your name has been taken from you. All identity and individuality vanquished. Your name has been replaced by the word Of and the first name of your Master. You are Offred, Ofglen, Ofcharles, you are a nobody, you belong to a man who's not your husband, but someone who uses your body as a vessel for procreation. If you do not provide a child, you are banished to the Colonies, to clear away the toxic mud and die.

This is the harrowing world of Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale. Strongly echoing George Orwell's 1984, we are witnessing the USA after a coup which established a totalitarian government. Who are the ones in power now? The Army? The Church? The two combined? Whoever they are, one of their aims is to turn women into creatures that are no longer considered human beings, but something a little superior to animals.

One of the most dramatic and poignant sequences of the book is a flashback to the day the coup took place.Offred describes the invasion in the Congress, the massacre of its Members and the President's, the day she discovers that her personal bank account has been handed over to her husband, naturally, without notice or explanation. It becomes known that the same has happened to every bank account that belongs to a woman. They have no right to have money, to work or to read.Furthermore, our narrator loses her job because the library is closed down under the threat of the army of the new State. The Constitution of the Unites States of America exists no more. The way in which Atwood describes the aftermath of the coup sent chills down my spine. The raw, but poetic language conveys the new, nightmarish, brutal reality clearly.

The relationship between Offred and her ‘‘owner'', the Commander is a complicated one. It is chilling in the sense that you feel something is about to happen, to change. There is great tension whenever the two characters are together as we share her suspicions and fear. Offred's relationship with Nick, the chauffer, is a dead-ringer for Winston's affair with Julia in 1984 and an additional reason for the reader to feel uncomfortable over Offred's future.

Her only way to escape her reality lies with her mind. Her thoughts and memories of an era of freedom. She isn't brainwashed, just as Winston wasn't brainwashed. The new States with their pious doctrines and the Ministry of Truth have failed to contaminate every single soul. There are some who remember and wish for the civilized world of the past -however problematic-, where women had identity and independence, where love wasn't a crime punished by death.

Offred takes heart only at the thought of her daughter for whom she hasn't lost hope that she is alive.It is the only way to keep her sanity, amidst the violence of her society. There is violence towards the women who are himiliated, punished for transgression and executed, there is violence towards the men who are believed to be members of the Opposition. They are vicioucly killed under false pretenses, in a way that turns the repressed women into beasts.

The Handmaid's Tale is a classic of our times. Is it original? No. After 1984 no dystopian novel can be called ‘‘original'', but unlike Orwell's bleak universe, Atwood allows a brief glimpse of hope, makes us think that all is not lost, that there are some -however few- who can fight against Hell and retain their sanity.

I didn't really like Margaret Atwood's writing style in Oryx and Crake and I'm not a huge fan of it here, but I have to say there are glimmers of enjoyment in the writing in this book.

I've never been a dystopia fan, but there is something chilling about the realism of some aspects of Gilead that might very well happen in our world, any time in the near future - all this despite the fact that this book in itself was published almost 2 decades ago.

Our lady in red
empty womb and stifled mind
bribed with a board game.

Prescient.

This took a long time for me to read. I kept having to put it down after reading only a chapter or two at a time. It was so realistic it nauseated me. I had that pit in my stomach you get when you are dreading something. Not that I was dreading the book so much, but what the book was telling of a future that isn't so unrealistic. There was nothing I was reading, where I thought, ‘that would never happen in real life' because to be honest, every single thing in this book could. And it's terrifying.

What an intense book. As dystopias go, this is one of the most oppressive, dark and inhumane ones in any book I have read.

I would have enjoyed it more as a short story. The politics and premise were great, but the plot itself wasn't strong enough to sustain 300+ pages. Still, worth reading if you haven't.

Where to start with this book? I guess I'll say what I liked and what I didn't like.

Liked:

The idea of this story. I'm all for dystopian, post-apocalyptic and so on books. The idea of women and men becoming sterile and having trouble making children, thus in the long run, having the threat of the human race dying out; is a really good idea.

The Eyes. The black vans pulling up and kidnapping people in broad daylight reminded me of Nazi Germany with the SS and Gestapo. Of the people in charge going mad with power, that they can do all of this and everyone turns a blind eye to it.

Moira. The one woman in this book who wasn't completely useless or dumb as a sack of potatos. A shame this book wasn't about her.

Didn't like:

The story felt all over the place. At the end (spoiler) the author gives a half assed reason as to why it seemed like this, because Offred had recorded her story on cassetes that were never labeled so years later the Professers who found the tapes had to guess what went where. It was a very lame excuse. The story didn't connect well and took me right out of it whenever it would change.

Offred herself. I get after having her family and rights and everything stripped from her, will change a person. But god damn I could not feel for her. She was a whiny little coward, she even says so in the book. That she'll tell the Eyes anything they want to know. She's also stupid as hell. She doesn't plot or plan to escape in detail, she just thinks of half assed ideas and never puts effort into them. Like an airhead...one second the idea starts to form and then the next she's thinking about flowers or something. Moira was a way better character and I wish the story had been about her, with Offred being the side character.

The sexism. Now I've read that people call this book 1984 but for feminists and how it's about women's rights and all that...but it's sexist. I know it's meant to be since the story is about a goverment power (?) who takes all the rights away from women and treats them as objects. But damn, when you have a shitty weak main character that just bends over to this BS and takes it...it loses the “feminist point”. I'm not a feminist even though I'm all for equal rights, so maybe I missed that part, but this book screams sexism.

The ending. It's bad. Hands down one of the worst I've ever read. It's like a TV show with that cliffhanger...and then it's done. Unless there was a follow up book (?), it just leaves off with a cliffhanger. Oh there's that crap about the Professor's but that's not an ending. Not a good one at least. It leaves so many questions unanswered. Like what happened to Moira and Offred? What about Offred's daughter, husband or Mother? The daughter is alive and adopted by a Commander and Wife but nothing else on her. Husband...dead or alive? At parts in the story it make's me think Luke is dead, other times I think he's alive? The Mother was seen in a film by Moira...that's it. And Nick...we can only guess what happened to him as well. This book just left me without answers and that's the sign of a piss poor book.

Overall feeling:

I'm glad I read it because it was a different take on dystopia from what I've read, but it was poorly written and left a lot of questions unanswered. I won't be reaching for it to reread it for some time but I also won't be chucking it into the donate pile. It's just good enough to sit on my shelf, but bairly. I wouldn't recommend reading this unless you ran out of dystopian fiction to read.