The Penelopiad Essay"We had no voice‚ we had no name‚ we had no choice‚ we had one face." (p195)The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood is a contemporary twist to the ancient myth of Homer’s ’The Odyssey’. The novel is set in Ancient Greek society where particularly women and lower-classes were severely subjugated and silenced. Atwood critically evaluates this patriarchal world through eyes of women. The timeless story of Odysseus‚ overflowing with phallocentric ideals and the traditional patriarchal discourse
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Margaret Atwood has a prevalent and reoccurring subject throughout her novel‚ Oryx and Crake. She includes this topic to further exemplify how humanity and art are intertwined; therefore‚ one cannot exist without the other. In this instance‚ the dystopian society has rejected self-expression and creativity as an acceptable form of pleasure. The result is that citizens have turned to gene splicing‚ public executions‚ and child pornography as a means for entertainment (Atwood …). Throughout this essay
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The book Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood is a beautifully articulated work of literature. The book presents a Victorian mode spiced up with spooky plot twists. Although the book presents a Victorian mode it is not entirely comprised of Romantic ideals. Atwood is a modern writer who was influenced by the major paradigms of both American and Canadian history. Since she was a child‚ she was fascinated by the true story of Grace Marks. Grace Marks was a teenage‚ Canadian domestic worker of the nineteenth
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Handmaid ’s Tale is a dystopian novel in which Atwood creates a world which seems absurd and near impossible. Women being kept in slavery only to create babies‚ cult like religious control over the population‚ and the deportation of an entire race‚ these things all seem like fiction. However Atwood ’s novel is closer to fact than fiction; all the events which take place in the story have a base in the real world as well as a historical precedent. Atwood establishes the world of Gilead on historical
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life when all of the sudden‚ her family was taken from her so she could go have somebody else’s baby. The Handmaid’s Tale is about a woman’s tale of her life‚ her story‚ and her struggles in a new society and how she got there. This story by Margaret Atwood tells the life of Offred‚ a handmaid for a wealthy couple and her daily struggles trying to adapt to her new world. Offred tells how she makes deals with her Commander and his Wife with hope of getting out and how that changes her life. The progress
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In her story Happy Endings‚ author Atwood speaks of various possible plots on what a happy ending is‚ almost like “what ifs?”‚ giving the reader a rush in each situation with a distinct “happy ending”. “Intended to ‘reveal the logic of traditional behavior and the many textures lying beneath ordinary life’” quotes the textbook. Causing the reader to wonder‚ “What is a ‘happy ending’?”. Everyone has a different interpretation of what a happy ending is and Atwood encourages her readers to explore their
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In ‘The City Planners’ by Margaret Atwood and ‘The Planners’ by Boey Kim Cheng‚ both poet uses the structure of the poem and language techniques to form the difference between the place itself and its identity. The uniformity between these two poems is the feelings of the poet expresses for this place. In ‘The City planners’ Atwood describes the place as “dry August sunlight”‚ this portrays an imagery of no lighting‚ dark and negative and also suggests to the readers that she do not like where
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While looking up facts about Margaret Atwood about her books and poems‚ she said something about her two books The Handmaid’s Tale and Oryx and Crake before being the first person ever to receive the first Arthur C. Clarke Award in 1987. Atwood said‚ “Science fiction has monsters and spaceships; speculative fiction could really happen.” In fact‚ I consider her statement true. Of course Atwood is a feminist but her works help spread the feminist movement. If one breaks down her statement‚ “Nothing
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natural‚ she threads her story along‚ revealing her characters‚ drawing the audience into something that isn’t at all what it appears. Slowly yet intensely‚ she reveals the principal of plot development that she is trying to deliver to her audience. Atwood begins with just fifteen puzzling words. She breaks the rules of conventional writing by using only three sentences for the paragraph‚ and addresses the reader directly “If you want a happy ending‚ try A.”
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companies and make new products to stay competitive in a growing field. What isn’t often considered‚ however‚ is how companies stay on top of their competition and whether their motives involve helping people‚ or making money. In Oryx and Crake Margaret Atwood highlights this ethical issue through the lives of characters directly involved in this business to show that companies both in the novel and in today’s society use poor and desperate people to further their businesses and turn a profit. Atwood’s
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