Margaret Atwood's "The Handmaid's Tale": A Dystopian Novel of Oppression and Resistance

jrgamejrgame: Un peu cher, mais comme il le faut pour l'étudier en terminale au lycée...
Et non, il n'est pas abimé, comme j'ai pu le lire dans certains commentaires : la couverture est "tâchée" avec des "bavures" de couleur noire, c'est normal, c'est voulu par l'artiste.
Reçu en 1 jour en Prime.

France on Sep 23, 2023

M: I hated this book. I read it quickly in a few hours, maybe that’s what made it worse, total immersion without respite.

I had feared I wouldn’t like it. I knew it was a dystopian novel, a nightmare future for women. But it came so highly recommended by everyone I know and with literary accolades, that I imagined my fears would be unfounded and I would be astounded and revel at the literary genius of Atwood.

Yes surely, she is a skilled writer and novelist. There is much to merit in her writing style, her descriptive prose, her storytelling skill, her power over language and metaphor to invoke deep emotion and bring scenes powerfully to life in our heads as we read.

But all of this talent does nothing to overpower how much I hated this story and how it totally sucked the life out of me and left me feeling very negative.

Maybe that’s the point you might say. Maybe that’s entirely what she intended, for you to feel a tiny slither of what it might be like to be Offred.

Probably.

But I have no use for such debilitating darkness or depression in my life. Why imagine such bad things into life when history and even current day is so replete...

United Kingdom on Feb 22, 2020

clarylovesbooks: TRAMA

In un mondo devastato dalle radiazioni atomiche, gli Stati Uniti sono divenuti uno Stato totalitario, basato sul controllo del corpo femminile. Offred, la donna che appartiene a Fred, ha solo un compito nella neonata Repubblica di Gilead: garantire una discendenza alla élite dominante. Il regime monoteocratico di questa società del futuro, infatti, è fondato sullo sfruttamento delle cosiddette ancelle, le uniche donne che dopo la catastrofe sono ancora in grado di procreare. Ma anche lo Stato più repressivo non riesce a schiacciare i desideri e da questo dipenderà la possibilità e, forse, il successo di una ribellione. Mito, metafora e storia si fondono per sferrare una satira energica contro i regimi totalitari. Ma non solo: c'è anche la volontà di colpire, con tagliente ironia, il cuore di una società meschinamente puritana che, dietro il paravento di tabù istituzionali, fonda la sua legge brutale sull'intreccio tra sessualità e politica. Quello che l'ancella racconta sta in un tempo di là da venire, ma interpella fortemente il presente.

TITOLO ORIGINALE: THE HANDMAID’S TALE
TITOLO ITALIANO: IL RACCONTO DELL’ANCELLA
AUTRICE: MARGARET...

Italy on May 20, 2018

MadhviMuses: ‘It isn’t running away they are afraid of .We wouldn’t get far. It’s those other escapes, the ones you can open in yourself, given a cutting edge’

Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood was in my TBR list since long. Thanks to one of online book club,I read recently and really amazed with it.

Plot:

As it is well-known fact that it’s a story set in distant future in dystopian USA. Country’s President is killed and parliament has been dissolved. Army takes over charges of entire nation. It is not regular army but Republic of Gilead.Its totalitarian regime governed by men only.

Entire story is narrated by protagonist Offred through tape recordings.

Offred is Handmaid. She is thirty -three. Her only job is to breed. Offred is not her real name. In Gilead society, all the basic human rights and freedom from women is taken away. They become second citizens. They have been categorized into Wives and Daughters of Commanders,Handmaids,Marthas and Aunts. Their functions and clothes are fixed according to their category and strictly watched by Guardians. If they don’t follow their duties, they are either hanged on wall or sent out to die...

India on Nov 14, 2017

A Discerning Buyer: “The control of women and babies has been the feature of every repressive regime on the planet”.
Many years back, when my sister and I were getting ready in the morning to drive off to office, gulping down our breakfasts, Mom said – you don’t know how lucky you are. I recalled her words as I read The Handmaid’s Tale.
Initially, I didn’t want to read the book. I prefer stories about real people, real events; this was a novel about a dystopian society sometime in the twenty second century. Who the Rulers are is unclear; they are referred to as “The Eyes”(like Big Brother in the novel 1984), and the country as “Gilead”. The protagonist is a woman (whose real name we will not know) who is attached to a powerful man called Fred; hence her name – Offred. As a woman, imagine a society where -
1) What you wear is decided by the authorities, and it includes white flaps like blinkers on the sides. Make up, cosmetics, creams and lotions are out of the question
2) Your body is not your own, but merely a child-bearing device for the rulers – a “ambulatory chalice”, a ”two-legged womb”
3) Your partner is chosen for you – and no, he is not the man...

India on Oct 02, 2017

Trick Brown: The Handmaid's Tale is a relatively "old" book in that it was first published in 1985, but it is still popular/well-known. This is not surprising as Margaret Atwood is one of those author’s whose work will endure as "literature" and she will still be well known in 100 years. That is, unless the Handmaid's Tale is prophetic and all secular literature is burned.

Don't worry, it won't be. However, it does have some elements that could be argued as being a caricature of modern day happenings. There are plenty of reviews out there that give a run down of the plot and how they feel it's all happening right now. No doubt many of these reviews are from women, and justifiably so since this book "speaks to them". So I'm going to discuss the subtext of the novel, and hopefully, I can get a few guys to read this book because there is stuff in it for them.

The background story is that The United States has been taken over by religious fundamentalists. The religion is never mentioned by name, but it is clearly Christian/Jewish/Islamic. When it comes to their respective flavors of fundamentalism, they all bear a striking resemblance to one another whether they want to admit it or...

United States on Aug 11, 2013

Mark Eremite: I knew nothing about this book when I bought and read it. I wish there were some way to review it without telling anything about it. The story definitely works better if you allow Atwood to bring you slowly up to speed. Stepping into the story with a knowledge of its setting and basic plot is bound to cause frustration, because Atwood parcels her secrets with great patience. So, if you want to enjoy this book as much as possible, and if you truly know nothing about it, then stop reading this review (and any others) and start reading THE HANDMAID'S TALE.

Still reading? Fair enough.

Atwood's story takes place in an alternate future where America (at least large portions of it) has been taken over by radical religious groups. The narrator of the tale lives in Gilead (in what we would call Maine), and she performs the functions of a concubine for a top-ranking political leader of this new, brutal regime. Everything in Gilead is (ostensibly) based on a religious (Christian) precedence, and so women's rights have been vastly curtailed. They are not even allowed to read.

Told in the first person, the novel's prose is beautifully done, although it does begin to drone...

United States on May 23, 2012