Preview

Handmaids Tale. Discuss the Contribution Made by One Major Characters in a Novel You Have Studied

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
672 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Handmaids Tale. Discuss the Contribution Made by One Major Characters in a Novel You Have Studied
Q. Discuss the Contribution made by ONE major characters in a novel you have studied
The main contribution made by the major character in the novel – The Handmaid's Tale is by the narrator- Offred. We suspect from various hints and clues that suggests that she is June. However, we are unable to confirm this with the book as the writer Margaret Atwood had decided not to tell us. Reason being that this source of text we were reading was an oral diary that the narrator - Offred wanted to leave down for other people to know but in the same time protect her and people that she cared for. So as a result of this all names were either disguised or changed to something else that had no similar meaning in common with the original name.

Offred is the narrator and the protagonist of the novel, and as readers we have been told the entire novel through her point of view, experiencing events and memories as vividly as she can. "I used to think of my body as an instrument, of pleasure, or a means of transportation, or an implement for the accomplishment of my will . . . Now the flesh arranges itself differently. I'm a cloud, congealed around a central object, the shape of a pear, which is hard and more real than I am and glows red within its translucent wrapping." Offred's describing, explaining, discussing the events to us, showing us that of her knowledge proving that she is an educated women before the new formed government as she plays around with words all of the time. She tells the story as it happens and identifies what floats up in her mind through flashbacks and digressions.

Offred is intelligent and a kind person that possesses enough faults and feelings that makes her human and normal compared to the top officials in Gilead. "There is something subversive about this garden of Serena's, a sense of buried things bursting upwards, wordlessly, into the light, as if to say: Whatever is silenced will clamor to be heard, though silently." That thinks they are the

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    Past and present, Offred’s peers play a huge role in how she narrates The Handmaid’s Tale. In the last few chapters of this reading, Offred encounters her old friend, Moira, who is now working as a prostitute at a secret club. In the times before biblical religion was the only form of governance, Moira was described as a fiery and rebellious woman, who was always there for Offred. While in the center, she teaches Offred how to care for the other women and keep her wits about her during this horrific transition period. However, the next and final time Offred sees her friend, Moira appears to have been tamed by the system and succumbed to Gilead's way of life. Offred is defiant to the way her friend has become as she states, “She is frightening…

    • 272 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Author Margaret Atwood’s writing has been shaped by one particular movement- the push for women’s rights in the 1960s and 1970s. When Atwood was a college student, “a woman was expected to follow one path: to marry in her early 20s, start a family quickly, and devote her life to homemaking” (“The 1960s-70s”). Employers assumed that the females who did work would soon become pregnant, so ladies were unlikely to advance in their careers. What money they did earn was controlled by their husbands, or their male wardens, as females are legally subject to them. With the development of the birth control pill a few years later, women could now chase professional careers and “the double standard that allowed premarital sex for men but prohibited…

    • 663 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Sample Question 3: In many works of literature, a main character has a mentor or mentor-like acquaintance whose influence dramatically changes how the character views not only himself or herself, but the world as well. Choose a novel or play in which a mentor exhibits such a strong influence, either beneficial or harmful, on one of the main characters. Then, in a well-organized essay, discuss the nature of the mentor’s influence and its significance to the work as a whole. Do not merely summarize the plot.…

    • 5382 Words
    • 16 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    She is also sacrificing her rights and privileges because women in the Gilead society are not allowed to work, pick who they want to marry, or speak up for themselves. Offred has also been suffering in which she is constantly thinking about her lost daughter, not knowing if she is alive or not. To worsen her suffering, Serena decides to give her hope by showing a picture of her daughter to her knowing that she will not be able to find her or do anything about it. Another reason why Offred is suffering is because of the deaths of the other handmaids. She has had to witness a handmaid being hung for being a “slut” and also her friend, Ofglen, who hung herself because she knew she was not going to escape from the bad people coming after her. In Chapter 14, under the list of what makes Christ himself, is that he was “thirty-three years of age when last seen.” In The Handmaid’s Tale, Offred described herself as “thirty-three years old ...[with] brown hair.” Atwood suggests that Offred has trouble remembering how she used to look like and seldom gets the chance to look at herself. The way that Offred is describing herself reveals that she will not stay 33 years old and will not always have a head full…

    • 640 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Handmaids Tale by Margaret Atwood takes place in the Republic of Gilead, in which women are placed in certain groups and stripped of their identity. Gilead focuses on bringing back old religious aspects into life by dividing individuals into biblical groups. The women especially the main character Offred is completely stripped of her name and possessions as well as being forced to not be able to talk, read, or write. In Handmaids Tale, by Margaret Atwood, the government of Gilead uses religious fear tactics in order to turn women against each other and strengthen their power.…

    • 620 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Type 1: The clitoris is held between the thumb and the index finger and amputated with one stroke of a sharp blade. Type 2: Then the labia minora and the labia majora are lacerated. Type 3: Finally, the remaining tissue is sewn, leaving a 2-3 mm hole where a twig can be inserted for urine and menstrual fluid. Tie the legs from hip to ankle together for 6 weeks in order to help the tissue bond. No anesthesia is to be used. Hygiene need not be taken into consideration. Side effects include bleeding, tetanus along with other infections, painful sexual intercourse, long delays during childbirth, and death. Psychological effects such as depression, anxiety and PTSD are also common in the women who undergo this procedure.…

    • 1206 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    “... the frown isn’t personal: it’s the red dress she disapproves of, and what it stands for … Once … I heard Rita say to Cora that she wouldn’t debase herself like that.” (Atwood 10). Marthas in Gilead take on the role of maids, cooks, and nannies of households. Once again there is a type of victim blaming between the statuses of women. Rita knows that Handmaids do not choose to be Handmaids, yet she still thinks that were she in Offred’s place, she would find a way out. The reality of Rita being different from all the other Handmaids is unlikely. If women in Gilead refused their roles they were made Unwomen and sent away to the Colonies, where they were tasked with cleaning up toxic waste. This sort of victim blaming misplaces the blame on the Handmaids instead of the government and once again prevents the unification of Gileadean…

    • 798 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Society can both be really great and progress forward, but at times society can turn for the worst and progress backwards. In Margaret Atwood’s Fictional book the Handmaid’s Tale. The main character Offred in the Republic of Gilead as a handmaid. In the book the purpose of a handmaid is to reproduce and bear children for older, wealthier men whose wives cannot have children. In addition to being a handmaid Offred and all the women of Gilead are not allowed to read, write, not own money, or dress immodest, men however have more power being able to read, write and are able to have their own money.…

    • 617 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Handmaids Tale

    • 536 Words
    • 3 Pages

    In the book, Margaret shows us a dark future where women have lost all their rights they once had and are now practically living as slaves. When she wrote this book she wrote almost as a warning to us and how quickly someone in power can take your cloths, family and possessions and turn you into a mindless human being. Throughout the book Offred (the main character) describes her daily life and often has flashbacks to the day she lost it all.…

    • 536 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The citizens can apply for a spouse, but if they are decided unworthy of one, the council has the authority to reject the application. These assignments stunts the ability for a loving relationship to form, as they are put together solely on compatibility of their skills. Also, the arranged couple have to be assigned a child, and can not have their own. Instead, women with the job of giving birth have the children, which are then promptly taken away and distributed. The Gilead, the government of The Handmaid’s Tale, uses a similar process to create their “perfect” families. If prior to the Gilead’s take over a couple was not in perfect accordance with the church, they are separated and reassigned by the Government. They also have any children they had taken away. Offred and her husband Luke’s marriage came about from him cheating on his wife, and therefore they are separated from each other and their daughter. The Gilead wrenched people away from their loved ones, making the new assigned mariages essentially love less. Even for couples who managed to stay together, such as The Commander and Serena Joy, the love in their relationships vanish under the pressure of the Gilead. The handmaids, or the women who are forced to have children for the wives, also have…

    • 617 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Offred uses these incentives left by "the others" and pushes through her self-doubt and apathy and begins to look for a life outside of her present unfulfilling existence. But all of this is to some extent; an attempt to make plans for escape. Through her turmoil, comes no full rewards, and the only factor that truly stays constant with the character is that she keeps recording her story. Like the handmaid before her, she finds hope in something that expresses freedom, though she may never get away from her present state, she finds something that mentally releases her.…

    • 583 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Handmaid's Tale

    • 1280 Words
    • 6 Pages

    The fact that the Commander is a hypocrite, he demonstrates his sympathetic qualities. The Commander built a society where there is no need for women to talk or think, and for women to only produce children; however, he contradicts himself though when he asks Offred, what her thoughts are, and what she thinks about whatever subject they are talking about. For example, the Commander repeatedly asks Offred what she thinks about men feeling again in this new society: “I like to know what you think, his voice says, from behind me. Come now, he says, pressing a little with his hands. I’m interested in your opinion. You’re intelligent enough, you must have an opinion”(210-211). This shows how the Commander is a hypocrite as he is expressing his sympathetic qualities and contradicts himself through his actions. He does not fully believe in this society of Gilead as well as the laws against women not being allowed to talk or think in general. The hypocrisy in the Commander…

    • 1280 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Handmaids tale

    • 1434 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Offred, a Handmaid, is one of the most important characters in the novel. Handmaids wear red dresses with white wings framing their faces and are treated like a special animal. She must eat dinner apart from the rest and her every move is surveillance daily. They 're the only ones that wear red, symbolizing fertility, the caste 's primary function that runs their society. As Handmaid 's, they have to do exercise, like walk, and “during these walks... never say anything that is not strictly orthodox.” If the Handmaids communicate with one another, they can only talk about things that are morally accepted and correct in the society. These women are property of the state, property “of” their commander; Fred is the commander and she is property of Fred, there to serve his sperms in order to bear him a child. “Household, that is what we are. The Commander is the head of the household. The house is what he holds” (Atwood 81), showing the no sense of identity that she attains and understands. “It was freedom to. Now you are being given freedom from” was said to Offred, to emphasize the patriarchy in this society. Places…

    • 1434 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Margaret Atwood’s novel The Handmaid’s Tale, is an eerie example of a “dystopian” novel. A dystopian novel portrays a terrifying picture of a world which makes the reader say, “what if?” Atwood wrote the novel in the 1980’s following the free-spirited, fun-loving period of the 60’s and 70’s. The plot, characters, themes, symbolism and setting of the novel display a picture of what the future world could be like if women’s rights were completely removed.…

    • 1585 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    His first ball

    • 1424 Words
    • 6 Pages

    QUESTION: 2 – How do you relate to a character/event/idea/setting in this text? Give your personal opinion of this character and reflect on why you think this:…

    • 1424 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays