Totalitarianism In The Handmaid's Tale By Margaret Atwood
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The theme of Totalitarianism in “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood All throughout the text “The Handmaid 's Tale”, there is a permanent theme of totalitarianism. Regimes that follow a totalitarian cultural ensure dominance over their subjects with the use of manipulation (Finigan 435). Besides the use of manipulation, the authority figures in “The Handmaid 's Tale” dominate the subjects by controlling their experience of life, time, memory and history (Finigan 435).
In the totalitarian society of Gilead, characteristics of totalitarianism can be found all around. One characteristic of totalitarianism is the use of placing members of society into categories. By doing this the regime of Gilead is able to manipulate …show more content…
“The Gilead regime’s assault on personal and social memory has created an almost unbridgeable chasm between the unstable signifier of Offred’s memories and the signified of past reality” (Finigan 441). Offred claims that her memories have been confiscated by Gilead. Atwood writes “His face was beginning to fade” (104) as she is talking about Offred’s memories of her husband Luke. Outlooks such as this let the reader know that Offred is becoming a victim of the current totalitarian state as her memories prior to the regime of Gilead are fading. Even memories of one’s own self tend to get lost as Atwood writes about Offred forgetting her own selfhood “I have trouble remembering what I used to look like” (143). On the same page Offred describes herself as “I am thirty-three years old.”, “I have brown hair, I stand five seven without shoes.”, “I have viable ovaries.” and “I have one more chance.” This leads the reader to believe that Offred is almost like a human robot which has been given a name and positioned into a category depending on the abilities of her body. Offred’s memory of having a personality and free mind is being stripped from her by the totalitarianism of
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The theme of Totalitarianism in “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood All throughout the text “The Handmaid 's Tale”, there is a permanent theme of totalitarianism. Regimes that follow a totalitarian cultural ensure dominance over their subjects with the use of manipulation (Finigan 435). Besides the use of manipulation, the authority figures in “The Handmaid 's Tale” dominate the subjects by controlling their experience of life, time, memory and history (Finigan 435).
In the totalitarian society of Gilead, characteristics of totalitarianism can be found all around. One characteristic of totalitarianism is the use of placing members of society into categories. By doing this the regime of Gilead is able to manipulate …show more content…
“The Gilead regime’s assault on personal and social memory has created an almost unbridgeable chasm between the unstable signifier of Offred’s memories and the signified of past reality” (Finigan 441). Offred claims that her memories have been confiscated by Gilead. Atwood writes “His face was beginning to fade” (104) as she is talking about Offred’s memories of her husband Luke. Outlooks such as this let the reader know that Offred is becoming a victim of the current totalitarian state as her memories prior to the regime of Gilead are fading. Even memories of one’s own self tend to get lost as Atwood writes about Offred forgetting her own selfhood “I have trouble remembering what I used to look like” (143). On the same page Offred describes herself as “I am thirty-three years old.”, “I have brown hair, I stand five seven without shoes.”, “I have viable ovaries.” and “I have one more chance.” This leads the reader to believe that Offred is almost like a human robot which has been given a name and positioned into a category depending on the abilities of her body. Offred’s memory of having a personality and free mind is being stripped from her by the totalitarianism of