women disunited - margaret atwoods the handmaids tale as a crit

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San Jose State University

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Master's Teses Master's Teses and Graduate Research

2008

Women disunited : Margaret Atwood's Tehandmaid's tale as a critique of feminism

Alanna A. CallawaySan Jose State University

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Recommended CitationCallaway, Alanna A., "Women disunited : Margaret Atwood's Te handmaid's tale as a critique of feminism" (2008).Master's Teses.Paper 3505.
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WO MEN DISUNITED: MARGARET ATW OOD 'S THE HANDM AID'S TALEAS A CRITIQUE OF FEMINISM

A T hesisPresented To

The Faculty of the Department of EnglishSan Jose State Un iversity

In Partial Fulfillment

of the Requ irements for the DegreeMa ster of A rts

by Alanna A. CallawayMay 2008


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UMI Number: 1458129

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2008Alanna A. Callaway

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APPROVED FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH

Dr. W illiam W ilson^4Uwv^ c$?7^ /\


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ABSTRACTWOMEN DISUNITED:

MARGARET ATW OOD'S THE HANDM AID'S TALEAS A CRITIQUE OF FEMINISM

by Alann a A. CallawayWhile there is plenty of traditional feminist critique of male power

structures in Atwood's works, and particularly in The Handmaid's Tale, this thesisargues that the power structure of Gilead (the biblically-inflected nation Atwoodimagines) also critiques the feminine roles that suppo rt and enable the repressionof other w om en. Placing the nov el in the contexts of Atw ood 's career, feminism,and dystopian literature, provides a fuller understanding of how the novelfunctions as an expression of the disunity of wom en.

Thus, this thesis turn s the focus of The Handmaid's Tale from theconsequences of patriarchal control and "traditional" misogyny, to thematriarchal network, and a new form of misogyny: wo me n's hatred of wome n.Read thusly, The Handmaid's Tale becom es a proph etic call to action.


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ACKNOWLEDGMENTSI wo uld like to than k Dr. Paul Dou glass, to wh om I am greatly indeb ted, for hiswisdo m, patience, and s upp ort. In addition, I wo uld like to than k Drs. WilliamW ilson an d K atherin e Ha rris for their time and intere st in this project. Finally, Iwould like to thank my family for providing their endless love and support, andmy hu sban d for creating the perfect writing space in wh ich I could com plete thisproject.

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Table of ContentsChapter 1 - Introduction 1Chap ter 2 - The Handmaid's Tale and the Feminist Tradition 12Chapter 3 - The Handmaid's Tale in Dialog w ith Specu lative Fiction 26Ch apte r 4 - Wom en Disun ited: The M atriarchy of Gilead 48Ch apte r 5 - Conclusion 63Wo rks Cited 69

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Chapte r 1In t roduc t ion

M arg are t A tw oo d is a prolific an d versatile write r. H er l i terary careerbegan in 1961 with the publication of her firs t poetry collection, DoublePersephone, and h as gr ow n to inc lude s ixteen poetry col lec t ions , twelve novels ,eight sho rt fiction collections, s ix children's bo oks , and five major non-fictionworks . Atwood has a lso edi ted s ix l i te rary anthologies inc luding, Survival: AThematic Guide to Canadian Literature, 1972, her most notable anthology, which hasbeen credi ted with rene win g interes t in Ca nad ian l i te ra ture . In addi t io n to th isgeneric divers i ty , Atwood's work offers thematic divers i ty: Canadian nat ional

ident i ty , re la t ions between Canada and the Uni ted S ta tes , re la t ions betweenCana da and E urope , the Can ad ian wi lde rnes s , env i ronm enta l i s sues,biotechnology, human r ights issues , and feminis t i s sues , a prominent themethroughout her career . Atwood's representa t ions of gender explore the socia lm yth s defining femininity , represen ta t ions of wo me n's bodies in ar t, the socialand economic exploi ta t ion of women, as wel l as women's re la t ions with eacho the r and wi th men .

At wo od character izes her novels in the fol lowing w ay: " the f i rs t t rio [The

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Edible Woman, Surfacing, and Lady Oracle] has to do with wo me n and m en, lasttrio [The Handmaid's Tale, Cat's Eye, and Robber Bride] with wom en and women,and then [one] in betw een [Life Before Man] ha[s] to do w ith both: [.. .] pointingtowards Cat's Eye and Robber Bride and one pointing towards Handmaid's Tale andBodily Harm" (Waltzing Again 219). Atw ood 's first five nov els, in particula r,demonstrate the range and complexity of her representations of sexual powerpolitics, and p rovid e a solid founda tion for und ersta nd ing th e evolution of herfeminist sympathies and how they inform The Handmaid's Tale.

In The Edible Woman (1969), Atwood examines the themes of rejection ofgend er roles, and loss of identity. M arian MacAlpin, the protagon ist, gr app leswith self-realization in the face of the limited options available to her as a young

w om an in the 1960s. She m ust first subm it to her pa ren ts' expectations and thento her fiance's plans. Marian fears that in marriage she will find herselfcompletely overwhelmed by her husband's strong personality, continuallysubmerging her desires in his own. She bakes a woman-shap ed cake (an "ediblewo ma n") an d offers it to her fiance, Peter. Natalie Palumbo believes Ma rian"ho pes to fend off her me taphorical co nsum ption by Peter, and re solve he r ow nambivalence to marria ge" (75). This exploration of the shortcomings of m arriageas traditionally envisioned re-em erges as a theme in The Handmaid's Tale.

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In Surfacing (1972), Atwood returns to the theme of identity, this timeexploring national as well as gendered identity. This narrative is filtered thro ughthe unnam ed female protago nist's deteriorating mind, in which reality, memory,fairy tales, an d myth olog y are fused. The pro tago nist perceives herself ascompletely isolated and disconnected from peop le around her. At the personallevel, she feels alienated from those with whom she is intimately involved,particula rly her lover an d he r best female friend. At the public level, she feelsmarginalized and politically dispossessed. Part of her alienation anddispossession stem from a lack of identity, which Atw ood expresses by leavingher unnam ed. In The Handmaid's Tale, Atwood again examines the importance ofnam es, particularly the nam es of female characters. As Natalie Cooke observes,

whe n com pared to Marian MacAlpin, the unnam ed protagonist of Surfacing m ay"find herself in a much stronger position as a woman of the 1970s" (68).How ever, the movem ent for wom en's liberation has not freed h er from male-impo sed pressu re to m arry, nor has it absolved h er of the guilt she feels as aresult of her abortion.

In Lady Oracle (1976) Atw ood explores duality and multiplicity asfunctions of identity. The prota gon ist Joan Foster construc ts a series of identities.This is her m echanism to secure love and acceptance, while avo iding the

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consequences of her actions. Foster fails to integrate these identities and spendsher life on the run , hiding he r true activities from the me n she is involved with.Foster is willing to stage her ow n de ath to maintain this fragmentation, therebyescaping responsibility for her actions and failed relationships. In TheHandmaid's Tale, we again see the female protagonist's struggle to reconcileconflicting identities: her socially proscribed identity and her authentic identity.

In Life Before Man (1979), Atwood explores gestures of resistance andsurvival at the individua l level. Carol Ann Howells asserts that these ge sturesillustrate the "m oral an d social evolution of hu m an being s" (67). The novelfocuses on dom estic relationships an d h ow events become catalysts for changeby cha nging the relationships themselves as well as the people w ithin the

relation ships. Na talie Palu m bo believes this change is really evolution,expressed as the characters cease "to hide in elaborate fantasy worlds [...] or inobsessive blaming of the past" (79).

In her fifth novel, Bodily Harm (1981), Atw ood "scrutinizes social m yth s offemininity" from the point of view of a wo m an who se body has been "dam agedby cancer and a mastectomy" (Howells 80). Rennie, the protagonist, struggles toaccept her body's betrayal, "the scar on he r breast splits open like a diseased fruitand som ething [...] craw ls ou t" (A twood 60). As Carol An n Howells observes,

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"Rennie's disgust at her ow n dam age d bo dy inevitably affects her accou nt of herrelationships with m en " (85). The sordid details of these relationships focus thenarrative on sexual pow er politics. Thus, "Rennie is forced to see ho w thepersona l and political canno t be sepa rated" (Howells 80).

The Handmaid's Tale, Atw ood's sixth novel, continues her explorations ofgender and identity as well as domestic politics. Since its publication in 1986, TheHandmaid's Tale has bee n the subject of intense critical dialog. A dystop iansurvival text set at the end of the twen tieth century o n the cusp of achievingequality between the sexes, The Handmaid's Tale portrays the dissolution of theUn ited States, resulting in w ha t Christoph er Jones rightly identifies as a"reinvigorated hatred of women and the explosive growth of religious

(patriarchal) fundam entalism " (4). T his hatr ed is realized in the colonizing forceof the Republic of Gilead, a puritanical, reactionary, militaristic regime. Jonescharacterizes this cultural shift succinctly; "in this future, m en h ave h ad it withup pity w om en and ' p u t them back in their place '" (3). A civil w ar is fought inorde r to ma ke wom en "malleable to men 's desires [.. .]. They mu st submit totheir socially determ ined roles or be seen as 'de m on s'" (G oldblatt 3) . Theseregressive social roles are determined by a caste system defining s tan dar ds forbehavior, dress, and social duties, thereby eliminating undesirable cultural

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tren ds an d beliefs, wh ile controlling a fearful and potentially reb elliouspopulace.

Unde rstandably, m ost criticism focuses on the "hyp er-patriarc hy" ofGilead (Jones 3). For example, David Coad's "H ym ens, Lips, and Masks: TheVeil in M argaret A twood's The Handmaid's Tale," examines how the veil, w orn byall wo m en in Gilead, functions as the crucial tool of subjuga tion, on e elem ent ofthe politics of dress w ithin the novel. Deb rah Raske, in her article, "M argare tAtwood's The Handmaid's Tale: False Borders and Subtle Subversions," exploresthe relationship between language and thought, identifying three languagesystems presen t in the novel: the Gilead system, the narrato r's system, and theacadem ic rhetoric of the novel's closing section. Raske examines the se la ngu agesystems as metho ds of control, and in particular, me thod s of controlling w om en.While both Coad's and R aske's observations are importan t for a c ompleteunderstanding of The Handmaid's Tale, the true focus of Atwood's novel lieselsewhere.

A second critical focus ha s been th e generic aspe cts of The Handmaid's Tale,wh ich are read in the context of a patriarchal order. In "Utopias of/f L angu age inCon temp orary Feminist Literary Dy stopias," Ildney Cavalcanti discusses theduality of langu age within this genre . Cavalcanti ma intains that langu age ha s

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l iberating potential wh en w ielded by the female characters opposing thelinguistic enforcemen t of the mascu line pow er stru cture. This is certainly aninteresting and important concept; however, Cavalcanti fails to explore howwomen use rhetoric to enforce oppression of other women. Margaret Danielsand Heather Bowen examine four dystopic novels from a feminist perspective in"Feminist Implications of Anti-Leisure in Dy stopian F iction." Daniels andBowen m aintain th at wo m en a re denied access to leisure in these societiesthro ug h the devalu ation or absence of persona l leisure spaces. They trace thisphenomenon in The Handmaid's Tale, Brave New World, Player Piano, and 1984.Daniels and Bow en have astutely identified a key meth od of the patriarch aloppression in Gilead, thou gh they do not examine how wom en den y other

w om en access to leisure. Oth er examples include Lionel Shriver's "Population inLiteratu re" an d Step hanie Barber Ham m er's "T he World as It Will Be? FemaleSatire and the Technology of Power in The Handmaid's Tale." Shriver focuses onthe treatment of population issues in modern fiction, suggesting three categoriesof representation: fear of decline, fear of excess, and fear of populationprofessionals. It is useful to un de rsta nd the concept of popula tion, pa rticularlyas it informs the establishme nt of m othering prac tices with in G ilead.According to Ham mer, Atwoo d has broken into the formerly male-dom inated

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gen re of satire and gained critical and financial success. H am m er as serts tha t thethem es and m otifs of the novel firmly em bed it in the satirical tradition. Atw oodchose satire as the most effective trope for critiquing the practices of Second-Wave Fem inism.

A third critical focus ha s bee n feminism. Evelyn Keller Fox examines thehistorical relationship betwee n science and feminism. Keller is particularlyinterested in the effect feminist scholarship ha s had on this relationship . W hileher article "Feminism, Science, and Postm ode rnism " is mo re of a generaldiscussion of science and gender, K eller touches specifically on ho wreproduction is controlled in The Handmaid's Tale. Un derstand ing this idea is keyto the influence of Science Fiction and speculative fiction on the creation ofThe

Handmaid's Tale. Shirley Neuman's "'Just a Backlash': Margaret Atwood,Feminism, an d The Handmaid's Tale" discusses an interview she conducted w ithAtwood after the operatic adaptation of The Handmaid's Tale. The m ain focus ofthis article is Atw ood's feminist sy m pathies and tendenc ies.

All of these critical foci are im porta nt; howev er, they m iss the c rucial poin tthat Gilead's pow er structure is an expression of the disunity of wo m en. W hileGilead's caste system repre sses me n an d w om en, it is the wo m en in positions ofpower, rather than the men, who m ake this system unpleasa nt and d ang erou s for

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w om en . This is the focus of m y thes is .First , the influence of feminism on The Handm aid's Tale is discu ssed. In

trac ing the development of feminism, a sus ta ined discuss ion of Second-WaveFem inism is offered. A tw oo d's evolving feminist symp athies are a lso examined,ma in ly th rough pub l i shed in te rv iews o f Atwood conduc ted be tween 1972 and2005.

Second, the development of the Utopian t radi t ion is t raced through textssuch as Mary Shel ley ' s The Last Man and C har lo t t e Pe rk ins Gi lman ' s Herland.The dys topic t radi t ion is a lso out l ined through the fol lowing texts : YevgenyZ a m y a t i n ' s W e , A l d o u s H u x l e y ' s Brave New World, and George Orwe l l ' s 1984.These texts were chosen because they seem to have inf luenced Atwood's crea t ion

of the Republ ic of Gi lead a nd becau se they are pr im ari ly conc erned w ith sexualpower pol i t ics .

Finally, i t is posited that within The Handm aid's Tale the rea l threa t inGilead com es no t f rom m ale bu t from female control . The ul t imate resul t of themicro-s t ra t if ica t ion in Gilead is the evolut ion of a ne w form of mis ogy ny, no t aswe usual ly th ink of i t , as men 's ha tred of women, but as women's hatred ofwo m en. Atw ood dep ic t s one v iab le back lash f rom ou r cur ren t femin is tmomentum: gynocen t r i c misogyny and " t rad i t iona l" misogyny combined in one

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militaristic social and religious order the Republic of Gilead. In other w ord s,the male- dom inated pow er structure relies on women to regulate one anotherand enforce social stan dard s. The philosop hy informing th e social structu re isnot unique to Gilead: "no empire imposed by force or otherwise has ever beenwith out this feature: control of the indigenous by mem bers of their own gro up "(The Handmaid's Tale 308).

Gr oun din g the social hierarchy in biblical and historical preceden ts, thema triarchy attem pts to disguise the reality of this universally deg radingw om en 's culture. For exam ple, the new family structure relies on "the m onthlyrape 'Cerem ony' [which] follows the scriptural 'and she shall bear upo n m ykn ees / and grotesquely requires the presence of Wife, Handm aid, andCo m m and er. It synthesizes the institutionalized hum iliation, objectification, andow nersh ip of wom en in Gilead" (Cavalcanti 166). M y interpretation takes this astep further. Because of the nature of hou sehold politics, and the un ique lymatriarchal content informing them, it is no longer the men, but the w om en wh oshould be feared.

Placing The Handmaid's Tale with in the contexts of feminism an ddystopian literature enables me to return to the text and reinterpret Atw ood 'screation of this reactionary society as a critique of Second-Wave Feminism an d a

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prop hetic call to action.

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Chapte r 2The Handmaid's Tale and the Feminist Tradi t ion

T o u n d e r s t a n d h o w The H andmaid's Tale functions as a response to Second-Wave Fem inism, i t i s im por tant to discuss tha t mov em ent ' s evolut ion from i tsear ly nineteenth-century roots through the 1970s . We shal l see tha t Margare tAt wo od a l igns herse lf mo re with Libera l Feminism, whic h was inspired by F irst -Wave Feminism, than with the Second Wave.

The pol i tica l and ideologica l foundat ion s of Second-Wave Fem inism reachback to the 1800s, a per iod not ed, as Jud i th Ho le and El len Levine observe intheir s tudy The Rebirth o f Feminism, for i t s "geographic expans ion, indus tr ia ldevelopment , growth of socia l reform movements , and a genera l in te l lec tualferment with a phi losophical emphas is on individual f reedom, the ' r ights of man 'and universa l educat ion" (2) . Early advocates for women's r ights focused onsuffrage because disenfranchisement was the most notable official exclusion ofwo me n. They be l ieved tha t s ecur ing wom en ' s r igh t to vo te wo uld b r ing soc ia l

recogni t ion of women's va lue which would lead to the moral and socia limprovement o f the en t i re popu la t ion .

In the course of this polit ical s truggle, feminist pioneers challenged

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prevalent soda l assumption s. For example, M ary Wollstonecraft a ttempted todispel the social myth rega rding w om en's inherent sentim entality in her 1792tract, "AVindication of the Rights of Wom en." In "The Subjection of Wom en"(1869) John Stu art Mill argu ed against th e Victorian the ories of biologicaldeterminism . And , in her 1873 speech "O n Wom en's Right to Vote," Susan B.Anthony questioned the validity of the Equal Protection Clause of the FourteenthAm endm ent. The efforts of these three prominent feminist pioneers illustrate thehum anist concern that inspired the struggle for the equality of wom en. In 1895the word feminism wa s recognized a s the label of the m ovem ent for the politicaland economic equality of the sexes. First-Wave Feminism culminated with thepassage of the Nineteenth A m endm ent in 1920, after w hich the w om en'smo vem ent w as virtually d orm ant for forty years (Hole and Levine 14).

In these forty yearsfrom 1920, to the re-emergence of the m ovem ent inthe 1960swomen's issues and concerns we re rarely considered to have an ylarger social m ean ing or significance. Reflecting on th is lull, M ordec a JanePollock, a former boa rd m em ber of the National Organization for W omen

(NOW), explains that a woman was "expected to enter into a monogamousmarriage, live in a nuclearoften emotionally isolatedfamily, and limit heractivities to domestic concerns, volunteer work, and social interests, that [were],

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in the final analysis, severely circumscribed" (16). And, as Hole and Levine pointout, "any discontent [women] felt was believed to have resulted from individu alma ladjustments" (17). H owever, the re-emergence of the women's m ovem entfostered an understanding that their distinct lack of opportunitieseconomic,legal, and social were in fact, a ccording to Pollock, functions of a"psychologically enforced cultural my th, a set of assum ptions a nd valuesconcerning wom en that has been transmitted consciously and unc onsciously form illennia" (16). Therefore, it becam e clear to Second-Wave Fem inists that thedeep-seated psychological roots of inequality had to be addressed to affectchange, and, in order to do so, a new strategy had to be adop ted.

Whereas First-Wave Feminism focused on officially mandated de jure

inequalities, most notably disenf ranchise me nt, Second-Wave Feminism viewe dunofficial de facto inequalities, such as discrimination and oppression, as equallyimp ortan t. Propo nents of Second-Wave Feminism viewed the personal as thepolitical and w ere determ ined to help wom en unde rstan d aspects of theirpers ona l lives as dee ply politicized, and reflective of a sexist structure of po wer.In her article "Changing the Role of Women," Pollock explains that one way toachieve this goal wa s to reveal that "th e sexist mythology exists because therelationship betwe en m ale and female is a political one, a relationship of

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superordinate to subordinatea nd a relationship that obtains in the mo stintimate and persona l as well as the most massive and public of our activities"(18). Acknowledging the political dimension of women's private oppression wasthe genesis of the new women's movement.

Second-Wave Feminism, also know n as the Wom en's LiberationMo veme nt, began as w ha t wou ld later be called Liberal or Mo derate Fem inism.Cha mpio ned by figures such a s Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem, LiberalFeminism a ttemp ted to reform or app ropriate existing political structures toadvan ce wo m en's interests along a civil rights mode l. The publication of BettyFriedan's The Feminine Mystique in 1963 encoura ged w om en to admit an dacknowledge the import of their feelings of personal dissatisfaction, urging themto seek ou t its social sourc es. This signaled an im po rtan t shift in the c ulturalperception of wom en, for the focus wa s shifted from "individu almalad justmen ts" to the endo rsed social orde r. Like their predecesso rs, LiberalFeminists argued that women deserve the same privileges, protections, pay andopp ortu nities as me n. As activist Birgitta Linne r astutely noted in 1972,

despite the enlightened laws enacted early in the century toimprove the status of women and create equality in marriage, thosein control of the institutions of societythe politicians and many ofthe religious leadersw ere successful in m aintaining thetraditional family role system and the public's adheren ce to it. It

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wa s no t until the 1960s tha t real deba te, research , and reformexploded. (55)

Prior to the "explosion" Linner refers to, efforts to raise awareness had beenprimarily focused on the political arena.

Th oug h the efforts of Liberal Fem inists and th e reception of The FeminineMystique had a profound imp act on the cultu re of the United States (Fox 1), themo vem ent w as not witho ut its critics. The main criticism of Liberal Feminismwas that it presented itself as the women's movement, despite its obvious focuson the malaise of white middle-class subur ban w om en. In short, LiberalFeminism ignored working-class and minority women, who, angered by furtherdisenfranchisement, channeled their dissatisfaction into the formation of subgrou ps as a me ans to further their specific causes and a gend as. Of these subgrou ps, the mo st pertinent to this discussion, as a m eans to und ersta nd M argaretAtwood's The Handmaid's Tale, are: Cu ltural Feminism, Separatism, Ma terialistFeminism, and Radical Feminism. Each of these sub-groups ado pted andadvanc ed a different perspective in the larger cultural deba te on wom en's issues,an ap proa ch Fem inist scholar Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner rightly characterizes as"representative of the rifts of the time" (27). Therefore, instead of participatingcollaboratively as pa rt of the same overall mov em ent, Second-Wave Fem inists

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often took separate, sometimes parallel, often conflicting, tracks. The result wasthat each sub-group was competing for authority and recognition, underminingwo me n's solidarity. Because of this, Atwo od, it wo uld appear, w as draw n tonone of these Feminisms.

For Atwo od, w ho h as been a politically active advocate of hum an rightssince the early 1960s, Cu ltura l Feminism lacke d a n over t political focus oragen da. This sub-g roup wa s concerned instead with recovering cultural andartistic expressions an d traditions that were unique ly female. Cultural Feministssought to move away from representing male-dominated institutions and valuesin favor of elevating w om en 's experiences and v alues. Professor Warren Hed gesbelieves their central dilem ma w as "how to create a 'gynoce ntric' culture w ithout

draw ing on a notion of 'universal ' sisterhood that may exclude some w omen "(1). This gynocentric culture is predicated o n the assum ption that w om en areinheren tly kinde r and gentler than men . Atw ood criticizes this assum ption inThe Handmaid's Tale, wh ere we see a wom an's culture maintained throughwom en's cruelty toward s one another.

Separatism also fell short in Atw ood 's view, for it argued that the wa ywomen can best care for and/or support one another and combat patriarchy isthro ugh the creation of female-only spaces and relationships. These spaces

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manifested themselves in the form of all-female ba nks, businesses, and socialagencies, and th e like. Ho we ver, the creation of these female-only spaces couldbe problematic in that wom en w ere choosing merely to separate themselves fromsociety instead of attem pting to educa te men a nd bring a bout som e social reform.Therefore, Separatism fails to offer a viable alternative to the existing system,which, according to Pollock, trains men "to equate power with power over others,to view ag gression as a valid me ans of problem-solving" (16, em phas is au thor's)thu s ensu ring the continuance of patriarch al systems for future gene rations.Hole and Levine characterize the Separatists as wom en w ho "took a pro-w om ananti-brainwashing position," explaining that "these women rejected thetraditional explanations for female behavior, agreeing with other fem inists tha t

w om en's beh avior is not the result of inhere nt psychological charac teristics"(139). Furth erm ore, as Hole and L evine poin t out, Separatists believed w om en 'sactions we re the result of "continual, daily press ure from m en" (140). Byrem oving them selves from the sphe re of male influence, expectation, andjudgment, women could freely express their true femininity and female identity.

Another potential downfall of Separatism was its tendency to encourageresentment betw een the sexes. The Handmaid's Tale contains hints of Atwood'scriticism of Separa tism. Offred's m other, a dedicated Second-Wave Fem inist

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comm ents: "I don't w an t a man a round, w hat use are they except for ten seconds'w orth of half babies. A m an is just a woma n's strategy for making other wo me n"(Atwood 121). This marked disdain for the male sex merely reversed the extantsocial attitudes, w ithou t offering solutions to the issue of gend er inequalities.

Materialist Feminism had a strong foundation in class-consciousness.This branch m ay hav e been initially appealing to Atwood because of her o wnliberal political leanings. Ho we ver, Atw ood ultima tely rejected th e MaterialistFeminist appro ach. M em bers of this branch of feminism w ere deep ly involvedw ith and com mitted to left-wing politics, and oppo sed capitalism in favor ofsocialism. They believed th at the path to freedom and equality lay in theabolition of the faulty economic system w hose division of labor n ecessarily

privileged m en over w om en, thereby relegating w om en to positions ofinferiority. Ho le and Le vine point out that for Materialist Fem inists, " 'wo m en 'sissues' [were viewe d] as p art of the larger struggle for socialist chang e" (108).Often this me ant that wom en 's issues we re submerg ed w ithin the drive forsocial, economic, and political revolution.

Radical Feminism, the branch of Second-Wave Feminism Atwood foundmost alarming, primarily focused on what prominent Feminist theorist bellhoo ks calls "the an nihilation of sex roles" (143). Radical Feminists drew on

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Cultural Feminism and Separatism and advocated, as Hedges points out,"nothing less than a complete revolution in terms of gendere d op pression andresistance on all fronts, public and private" (2-3). Radical Feminists wereconcerned w ith the implications and effects of wom en's oppression u nd er thepatriarchal social order. Radical Feminists sought to create aware ness of thedispa rate nee ds of wom en thro ugh th e identification and deep er politicization of"women's issues," more specifically, reproductive rights, pornographylegislation, sexuality, and equality in relationships. As hooks observes inFeminist Theory From Margin to Center,

Fundamentally, they argued that all men are the enemies of all womenand propo sed as solutions to this problem a Utopian w om an nation,separatist comm unities, and even the subjugation or e xterminationof all me n. Their anger may ha ve been a catalyst for in dividu alliberatory resistance and change. It may have encouraged bondingw ith other wo m en to raise consciousness. It did not stren gthenpublic und ersta ndin g of the significance of authentic feministmo vem ent. (34-35, em phasis author's)

hook s believes this adversarial appro ach reignited "the wa r between the sexes"(38). Hole an d L evine maintain tha t as early as 1968 it becam e eviden t that "thenew wo me n's mov em ent w as not going to limit itself to stateme nts of p rinciplesor traditional actions of political protest. Targets of wh at radical w om enconsidered 'sexism ' we re everyw here, and susceptible to attack" (124). Atw ood,

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w ho stud ied in America d urin g the late 1960s, seeme d baffled b y thisantagonistic approac h. As she comm ented in a 1978 interview, "I've alwayswo nde red [.. .] do so man y wo me n think of them selves as me naced on all sides,and of their husband s as potential mu rderers?" (Waltzing Again 44). Atwoodwo uld agree with hoo ks tha t this fear could poten tially lead to a significantmisunderstanding of the aims of the Women's Liberation Movement.

It wo uld seem, then, that Atw ood w as oppose d to the concept of the warbetween the sexes. While she supported social equality for women, she did notenvision antagonistic beh avior s or approach es as the mean s to achieve this.Atwood's broad humanist concerns align her more with the views of First-Waveand M oderate Feminists and m ake her skeptical and w ary of the mo re radical

expressions of Second-Wave Fem inism.For Atwood Second-Wave Feminism contained three central dilemmas.

The first tren d of Second-Wave Feminism that troubled Atw ood wa s the lack offemale solidarity. Th ou gh all Second-Wave Feminists wo rke d to end de factoinequalities and, therefore, often pursued complementary purposes, they weremost frequently at odds with one another. Instead of embracing the myriadissues confronting w om en across socio-economic lines, Second-Wave Feministstende d to advance a single age nda , issue, or cause at the expense of all others.

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This resulted in resentment and distrust as well as self-segregation.In The Handmaid's Tale Atwood depicts this disunity primarily through

Gilead's caste system in which wo m en are assigned a particular role andconcom itant dress and duties, with no ho pe of ever breaking free of these rolesexcept through prostitution, exile, or dea th. The Gilead takeover can be read asstemming, in part, from women's lack of solidarity in pre-Gilead culture andsociety. The social struc ture of Gilead reinforces and h eigh tens thes e feelings,most disturbingly, as we shall examine in the fourth chapter, through thematriarchal regulation and enforcement of Gilead's patriarchy.

The second difficulty Second-Wave Feminism posed for Atwood was thechanging definition of the wo rd "wo m an," resulting from the trem end ous socialuphe aval created by the re-emergence of the woman 's movem ent in the 1960s.Because the m eanin g of the wo rd " wo m an " was being redefined, the re was agrea t deal of insecurity abou t wom en's roles in society. Tha nks, in pa rt, to theefforts of Betty Friedan, who defined th e "problem with out a nam e," ma nywo m en aw oke to the realities of the oppression su rroun ding the m. With this

awaren ess they turn ed a critical eye on nearly every segm ent of society and theyfound ex pressions of sexism perm eating their culture. Sudd enly traditionalsocial expectations were stifling. W omen found themselves caught in limbo,

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certain of their dissatisfaction with the socially circumscribed roles but oftenunable to imagine viable alternatives.

In her stud y Margaret Atwood: A Critical Companion Carol An n H owellsexplains how she sees this struggle reflected in Atw ood's w ork: "the greatestchallenge for a wo m an w riter is ho w to position herself in response to changingcultural definitions of 'w om an ' and its 'constellations' like 'feminine' and'feminist'" (8). W hen asked by Jo Brans in a 1982 interview if she wa s "a feministwriter" Atwood replied, "Feminist is now one of the all-purpose w ord s. It reallycan mean a nything from p eople w ho think me n should be pu shed off cliffs topeop le wh o think it 's O.K. for wom en to read and w rite. All those could becalled feminist pos itions" (Conversations 140). Because of the broad scope of the

term "feminist, " Atwoo d is ambivalent abo ut being labeled as a feminist w riter,and defines herself instead as a person concerned with human dignity,characterizing her "feminism" as "human equality and freedom of choice"(Waltzing Again 81). She does believe in social equality of w om en b ut d oes notsubscribe to many of the techniqu es and attitude s of Second-Wave Fe minists.Therefore, she is hesitan t to be rega rded as their cha mp ion. Inde ed, she assertsthat her "characters are not role models" nor does she "try to resolve theproblems of the living [or] deal out the answers" (Waltzing Again 33). Rather, her

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role is m ore reflective. Instead of dealing o ut the answ ers, Atw ood pos esquestions and explores the possibilities of social movements.

The third dilem ma of Second-Wave Feminism w as the antagonisticattitude toward me n adopted by m any segm ents of the Wom en's LiberationM ovem ent. This attitu de found a variety of expressions ranging from the 1968Miss Am erica pagea nt protest, to "take back the night ma rches," to somewomen's refusal to interact with men in any capacity. This inherentlyantagonistic attitude often fostered a reaction in some men Atwood characterizesas , "H ere is this enormo usly pow erful an d m alevolent female, and she is gonn agetcha" (Waltzing Again 19). This sentim ent can be read as a reflection of th esocial milieu th at could give rise to an anti-feminist bac klash.

Critics of Radical Fem inism from the political left, including M aterialistFeminists, strongly disagree with the Radical Feminist position that theoppression of wom en is fundamen tal to all other forms of oppression. Thesecritics ma intain t hat issues of race and of class are at least as im por tan t as issu esabout gender. Liberal Feminists, which include M argaret Atwood, often seeprecisely the radicalism of Radical Feminism as potentially un derm ining thegains of the wom en's mov emen t with p olarizing rhetoric that invites backlashand contend that they overem phasize sexual politics at the expense of political

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reform. The Handmaid's Tale is Atwood's exploration of these central dilemmas ofRadical Feminism, which provides the catalyst for the backlash scenarioenvisioned by Atwood in her creation of the dystopian society of Gilead.

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Chapte r 3The Handm aid's Tale in Dialog with Speculative Fiction

The t radi t ion of Utopian and d ys to pian l i te ra ture is r ich and com plex, an di t i s rooted, as Ad am Roberts argu es in his s tudy The History of Science Fiction, inc lass ica l l i te ra ture . Acco rding to Roberts , there wa s an inter lude betw een 400A.D. an d 1600 A.D . H e ar gu es "th e na sce nt form [...] in A nc ien t Gr eece [...]d isappears , or becomes suppressed, wi th the r ise to cul tura l dominance of theCathol ic Church; and re-emerges when the new cosmology of the s ixteenthcentu ry inflects the theolog y of Protes tan t th inkers in the sevente enth " (xii i) .Atwood character izes Utopian and dys topian l i te ra ture as "specula t ive f ic t ion,"and bel ieves tha t if novel is ts a re com mit te d to th is genre , they ma y be able to te l lus some th ing abou t the fu tu re (Waltzing Again 259). Speculative fiction isuniq uely able to achieve this goal becau se , as N ort hr op Frye main ta ins in his1965 tract, "Varieties of Literary Utopias," "The Utopian writer looks at his ownsociety firs t and tries to see what, for his purposes, i ts s ignificant elements are.

The Utopia i tself shows what society would be l ike if those elements were fullydeveloped" (205) .

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Therefore, ac cording to Frye, Utopian writers be gin w ith "an analysis ofthe present, the society that confronts the mythm aker, an d they project thisanalysis in time or space " (205). Like Frye, w ho w as am ong h er m entors atHarva rd, A twood believes "Literature can be a mirror, and people can recognizethemselves in it and this ma y lead to change" (Waltzing Again, 34, emphasisauthor's). It is the uniq ue d uty of the speculative novelists of dystop ias, then, toreflect our most damaging and/or dangerous social trends taken to their logicalconclusion, to spu r us to eschew our hubris. Atw ood cites We, Brave New World,and 1984 as classical exam ples of the genre of dysto pian fiction. Inde ed thesetexts, along with Utopian texts like The Last Man and Herland, were central to thedeve lopm ent of the genre and influenced Atw ood 's creation of Gilead.

Ma ry Shelley's The Last Man and Charlotte Perkins Gilman's Herland offerglimpses of Utopias in accordance with Frye's definition: "an ideal or flawlessstate, not only logically con sistent in its structure b ut p erm itting as m uch freedomand happiness for its inhabitants as is possible to hum an life" (210, emp hasismine). Evgenii Zamatian, Aldou s Huxley, and George Orwell take th e oppositeapproach in their respective dystopian novels: We, Brave New World and 1984. Atthe core of these seminal works are social debates about the nature and amount

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of freedom pro vid ed c i tizens , as wel l as w ho ul t im ate ly dic ta tes an d controls th isf reedom.

While there are cer ta inly other Utopian and dys topian novels tha tinf luenced Atwood to varying degrees , the f ive novels discussed here conta inelements tha t a re part icular ly important to an analys is of The Handm aid's Tale as acr i t ique of Second-Wave Feminism because each is concerned with sexual powerpol i t ics and re la t ions betw een th e sexes, and shares ma ny oth er s imilar it ies , bo thwi th each other , and with A tw oo d's text . For each text a specific thread h as bee ni so lated which A two od took up a nd ex t rapo la ted in the c rea t ion of he r work : theda ng er s of polit ical excess, the Utop ian idea l of female solid arity, th e polit ics offreedo m, the polit ics of caste, an d, finally, failed po lit ical resis tance .

Th e Last Man: Dangers of Political ExcessM ary Shel ley w as am on g the f irs t Engl ish wr i ters to explore the

es tabl ishm ent an d su bseq uen t fa ilure of wh at cr i tic M orto n D. Paley ca lls a"millennial society" (xii)1, base d on futuris t ic projec t ions extrapola ted from herow n socie ty . Inspired by these socia l t rend s , and the peo ple w ho ha dsur rou nd ed he r such as he r l a te hu sba nd Pe rcy Bysshe She lley , Lord Byron ,

1 Paley argues that Shelley's intention is "not to endorse but to ironize such millennial optimism" (xii). Hebelieves "Shelley's novel is important not only for the power of its presentation of an archetypal story but

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an d the o ther me m be rs of thei r g rou p (The Elect)Shel ley created a societycapable of in f in i te goo dne ss and ach ievem ent , a t leas t tem porar i ly . In the post -p l ague wor ld o f The Last Man, ci t izens are ab le to thr ow off the yo ke of serv i tudeand the bu rde n of pover ty .

These advance s a re ma de poss ib l e by the newly es t ab l i shed ega l i ta r i anrepublic, which, as Shelley scholar Julie Schuetz observes, "reflects Percy 's idealsfor Utopian poli t ical reform an d [...] th e family-poli t ic" (1), Ro ma ntic val uesShel ley suppor ts and s imul taneously subver ts . Schuetz bel ieves that "because ofthe unm ed ia t ed ann ih i l a t ion tha t t he p l ague enac ts on man k ind , t he p l ague thusbecom es a met ap hor for the dest ruct ive effects of excessive pol it ical ideal i sm "(1). If The Last Man is a cri t icism of excessive poli t ical idealism, i t can be read as a

p recu rso r to The Handmaid's Tale. Atwood also fash ions a dest ruct ive force, inthe form of a mili tary coup, as a means to free society from the excesses of thesocio-pol i t ical movement of Second-Wave Feminism.

The Last Man a n d The Handmaid's Tale offer tw o d is t inct and d iametr ical lyopp ose d react ions to the dest ruct ive forces wi th in the nove ls . As Paley notes ,

the in i t ia l res is tance to the p lag ue in [The Last M an] seems tosuppor t bo th Mary ' s ideals for communi ty as wel l as Percy ' s idealsof an egali ta rian social ord er. [...] On ce the pl ag ue arriv es in

also for its ironical undermining of high R omantic themes, such as the empow erment of the imaginationand the possibility of creating a millennial society" (xvi).

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England, the novel places an even stronger em phasis on com mu nalresistance to the plague, a communal resistance which advocatesegalitarianism. (ix)

How ever, A twood's text lacks any com mun al resistance. Wom en in pre-GileadU.S. Society lacked the comm unal iden tity to resist the coup. This wa srepresentative of the rifts within Second-Wave Feminism, a movement thatstruggled to addre ss a diverse array of social, economic, and political concernsfacing wo m en in the deca des betw een 1960 and 1990.

By contrast, Shelley's vision of com mu nal resistance is inspiring. Vern ey,the protago nist, extols the virtues of the post-plague society:

As the rules of order and pressure of laws were lost, some beganwith hesitation and wonder to transgress the accustomed uses ofsociety... We were all equ al now ; magnificent dwe llings, luxurio uscarpets, and bed s of dow n wer e afforded to all. .. We we re all equalnow ; bu t near at hand w as an equa lity still mo re leveling, a statewh ere beauty and strength, and w isdom, wo uld be as vain as richesand birth. (317)

Shelley has created a world which centers on an egalitarian comm unity. W ithoutthe driving force of social com petition, all survivo rs are reduce d to their co mm onhumanity, a potentially unifying force in this post-apocalyptic nightmare.

Tho ugh inspiring, Shelley's vision is far from perfect. As Paley astutelypoints ou t, "this egalitarian system is un der m ined by the fact that it is only in theface of dea th that it is possible" (x). Lacking her hus ban d's Rom antic idealism,

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Shelley offers a m ore prag ma tic assessment of hu ma nity. Social har m on y couldnot be effected by reform ing the severely flawed extant social structures, nor,indeed, through any political avenue. Instead, these structures had to bedestroy ed. Equality is achieved by force, not by choice.

Atw ood also prese nts Gilead as an ironically egalitarian society. As theAunts remark at the Rachel and Leah Re-Education Center, each woman shouldbe happy in the knowledge that she is performing her own socially assigned task;wo m en a re ostensibly unite d a nd relieved of the burd en of mu ltiple social roles:wives, moth ers, worke rs, cooks, and m aids, to nam e but a few. Instead ofjuggling all of these social functions, the wom en of Gilead are assigned only oneof these roles, a system design ed to foster cam araderie: "Wo me n united for acom mo n end! He lping on e another in their daily chores as they walk the path oflife together, each perform ing h er appo inted task " (Atwo od 162). Thus, eachwoman works for the greater good of the community and the glory of Gilead.However, this Utopian society is designed to oppress and control people ratherthan to improve their lives.

While the idealism in Shelley's world is un der m ined by th e fact that it isonly achievable throu gh dea th, in Atw ood 's world, the Utopia of Gilead isundermined by Offred's remembrance of the time before:

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t he d i sh towel s are wh i te w i th b lue s t r ipes . Di sh tow el s are the s a m eas they always were. Somet imes these f lashes of normal i ty come atm e from the s ide , l ike amb ushe s . The o r d i n a r y , the u s u a l , areminder , l ike a kick. I see the d i sh towel , out of context , and I catchm y b r e a t h . For s o m e , in som e wa ys , t h ings hav en ' t changed tha tm u c h . (48)

A n d so, an i nnocuo us domes t i c i t em t akes on t r e m e n d o u s i m p o r t a nc e . Theent i re social s t ructure of Gilead is, at l eas t momen tar i ly , undermined by a w h i t ed i sh towel w i th b lue s t r ipes .

Herland: Utopian Fem ale So l idari tyIn her 1915 nov el la Herland, Char lo t t e Perk in s Gi lman a l so t akes up the

t h e m e of an egal i tar ian society . Gi lm an ' s Utopian v is ion centers on a w o m e n ' scul ture la ter asp i red to by Second-W ave separa t i s ts . The w o m e n of H e r l a n d arep r o s p e r o u s and h a r m o n i o u s in their isolated, female-only society. Their culturei s th rea t ene d by the i n t ru s ion of the th ree male t ravelers : Van, Terry , and Jeff.Throughout Gi lman ' s br i l l ian t ly sat i r ic novel la , the t h ree male t r ave le rs a t t e mp tto exp la in m ode rn gen der r e l a t ions to the w o m e n of H e r l a n d . In r e s p o n s e to thewomen ' s gen t ly p rob ing ques t ions , Jeff, Van, and Terry s t ra in to find the logic ofin tegral social ins t i tu t ions , such as m a r r i a g e and family:

[Terry] squared his broad shou lder s and lifted his chest . "We donot a l low our w o m e n to w o r k . W o m e n are lovedidol izedh o n o r e d k e p t in the h o m e to care for the chi ldren ."" W h a t is the ' h o m e ' ? " a s k e d S o m e l a little wistfully.

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But Zava begged: "Tel l me first, do no w o m e n w o r k , r e a ll y ? ""W hy , yes , " Ter ry admi t t ed . "Some have to , of the poorer sor t . "" A b o u t how many in you r coun t ry?"" A b o u t s e v e n or eight mill ion," said Jeff, as m i s c h i e v o u s as ever .(45)

Exchanges such as t hese emphas ize the feminis t th rust of Gi lman ' s nove l l a .I n d e e d , she reveals that the social const rain ts p lace d on w o m e n s t e m fr om men.U p p e r c l as s w o m e n are e i ther " a l lowed " to w o r k at t h ei r h u s b a n d s ' w h i m , or" ido l i zed" and " h o n o r e d " by be ing kep t at hom e, wh i l e mi l l ions of p o o r e rw o m e n h a v e to w o r k , out of economic necessi ty .

The three male t ravelers s t ruggle wi th the H e r l a n d i a n p a r a d i g m tovary ing degre es . Terry , the most t rad i t ional male character , pers is ten t ly t r ies tocontro l Al ima, his He r land ian "b r ide . " T er ry w ou ld p re fe r Al ima to give up her

communal ob l iga t ions and r e m a i n at hom e. Al ima res i s ts his a t t e m p t s to" h o n o r " and " ido l i ze" her; Alima refuses to a s s u m e the wifely ro le Terrycons t ruc t s for her . Al im a' s social du t ies are a sou rce of h o n o r and p r i d e andm o r e i m p o r t a n t th a t her private dut ies . Terry is so c o m m i t t e d to the t rad i t ionalw a y of v i e w i n g the social in teract ion between men and w o m e n t h a t he is d r i v e nto a r ape a t t emp t when Al ima re fuses to par t i c ipa te in recreat ional sex . Jeff, att he oppos i t e end of the spec t rum , qu ickly and wi l l ing ly adop t s Her l and ianvalues , thus lending val id i ty to the w o m e n ' s c u l tu r e . He quickly rejects the

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t r ad i t iona l op in ion of wom en as we aker in fe rio rs wh o mus t e ither be dom ina tedor coddled; ins tead , Jeff accepts the women as equals , worthy of mutual respect .

V an eloq uent ly voices Jeff's rea l izat ion , whic h i s a lso , in par t , h is ow n:W hen w e say men , ma n , man ly , manho od , and a l l t he o thermascu l ine-der iva t ives , w e have in the back g roun d o f ou r m inds ahug e vague c ro wd ed p ic tu re of the wo r ld and a l l i ts ac t iv i t i e s . . . .An d wh en we say w om en , we th ink female the sex . Bu t to thesewomen . . . t he word woman ca l l ed up a l l t ha t b ig backg round , sofar as they had g one in soc ia l deve lopm en t ; and the wor d m anmeant to them only malethe sex . (80)

V an has also come to th ink of wo m en n ot as infer ior, yet a t t ract ive males , bu t asfu lly hal f of hu m an i ty con st i tu t ing thei r ow n social g ro up . A nd so Va n reverse sh is previously held opin ions that men are so lely responsib le for humana c h i e v e m e n t .

The wo m en o f He r l and m us t a l so r e -examine the i r op in ions , va lues , andbel iefs ab ou t the opp osi te sex . In the absence of me n, these wo m en hav e come toth ink of me n as a k ind o f w om an and to assum e tha t t he men o f the ou t s ide m us tbe as devoted to reason , cooperat ion , and ch i ldren as they are . Terry ' s a t temptedrape o f Al ima de ep ly shocks these wom en . Ter ry ' s act w as a par t i cu la r ly m alekind of v io lence, d i rected a t ano ther p erson , no t as an ind iv id ual , bu t as aw o m a n .

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The women of Herland must expand the scope of their definition ofhum anity and un dersta ndin g of me n in order to keep their wo me n's cultureintact. Despite the travelers ' attempts to alter the wom en's views, the wo me nresist their attempts to change Herland, strengthened by female solidarity.

Gilead stand s in stark co ntrast to He rland, lacking the stron g bond s offemale friendship, com mu nity, and respect. Atw ood p aints a chilling picture ofwo me n disunited. The wo me n of the pre-Gilead United States do not assertthemselves in the face of the puritanical m ilitary regim e whic h seeks to "re turnto traditional value s" (Atwo od 7). Instead, they a re complicit in their own fall.In her article "From Irony to Affiliation in M argare t Atw oo d's The Handmaid'sTale," Jennifer A. Wagner-L awlor observes that Offred is "politically comp lacentbefore the takeover" (83). Reflecting on the coup, Offred rem em bers the fewcitizen protests, which she did n ot attend becau se "Luke said it wo uld b e futileand I had to think about them, my family, him and h er. I did think abou t myfamily. I started do ing more housew ork, more baking. I tried not to cry atmealtimes" (Atwood 180).

Offred's complicity could be characterized as passive. However, somewomen in The Handmaid's Tale we re actual agents of Gilead. Serena Joy, forinstance, w as a we ll-know n television personality wh ose speec hes, as O ffred

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reme mb ers , "were abou t the s anc ti ty of the house , abou t ho w w om en shou ldstay home" (45). Offred found these speeches and Serena ' s earnes tnessfr ightening (46) . Th rou gh ou t the nov el Offred observe s Serena , the Wife of he rpos t in g. O ne of her mo st te l l ing ref lec t ions abo ut Serena ' s pro m otio n of thesetradi t ion al va lu es is ho w Serena reacts to the rea l ity of be in g a Wife in Gilead:"She doe sn ' t m ake speeches anym ore . She has becom e speechless . She s tays inhe r hom e , bu t it doesn ' t s eem to agree wi th he r . H ow fur ious she mu s t be , no wthat she ' s been take n a t her wo rd " (46). A l tho ugh Serena was c lear ly an age nt ofGilead, she , too, has been t rapped by i ts oppress ion.We: the Politics of Freedom

Op pres s ion is a centra l the m e in Evgen i i Zam atian ' s 1921 nov el We. A

class ic dys topic w ork, We is a forerunner of novels l ike Brave New World a n d1984. Zam atian ' s Un i ted S ta te is a r ig idly control led socie ty found ed on theprem ise tha t f reedom a nd happ ines s a re incompa t ib le . In the " In t roduc t ion" tothe 1956 reprint of We, Pe te r Ru dy po in t s ou t tha t "m en a re congen i ta l lyincapable of us ing the ir f reedom for cons truct ive ends and merely makethem selves m iserable by the ir abuse of it ; m ost of the m ye arn for m ater ia l is t ichapp ines s and a re eage r to su r ren de r the i r t roub lesome f reedom and to bereduced to the s ta tus of lo tus-ea ters" (vi i i ) . In Zamatian ' s novel , which Rudy has

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labeled "an advan ced textbook for the regimentation of m ank ind" (ix), everypublic and private function falls within the jurisdiction of state control. Allactivities are precisely schedu led, by d ate of occurrence, dura tion, andauthorize d co-participants. The United State prom otes reverence for rationalityand operates with mathematical precision.

Argua bly, the m ost troubling aspect of the book is not the impossibility ofZamatian's United State, but rather the uncertainty about when the fictive UnitedState wo uld become a reality. Rud y argues that Zam atian's novel reveals, "thateven if m an is born a rebel at heart, his psychological ma ke-u p is so plastic thathe can usually be effectively intimidated to the point w her e he w ill accept arigidly con trolled pa tter n of life for a long period of time" (viii-ix). Theprotagon ist, D-503, exemplifies this willingness to accept re gimen tation:

Oh, how great an d divinely limiting is the wisd om of walls andbars! This Green Wall is, I think, the greatest inv ention everconceived. M an ceased to be a wild animal the day h e built the firstwall; ma n ceased to be a wild m an only on the day w hen the GreenWall wa s completed, whe n by this wall we isolated o ur machinelike, perfect w orld from the irrational, ugly wo rld of trees, birds,and beasts... (89)

As D-503's musing s reveal, regimentation provide s security. Rationality isprotected from irrationality; order is isolated from chaos.

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Just as many readers in the early- to mid-twentieth c entury w ere acutelyanxious about Zamatian's ideas coming to fruition, Atwood expressed heranxiety abou t the inevitability of the backlash scenario following the w om en'sliberation mov eme nt of the 1960s and 1970s. Com poun ded by the w idesprea dtrend of social freedom in American culture during these decades, the women'smovement further exacerbated proponents of traditional values.

The leaders of Gilead envisioned a retur n to these value s: a re-aw akeningof mo rality and a promo tion of faith-based guidelines to com bat social chaos. AsA unt Lydia tells her Ha ndm aid trainees in Chapter 1, '"There is more than onekind of freedom [...] Free dom to and freedo m from. In the day s of ana rchy , itwa s freedom to. No w you are being given freedom from. Don't und errate i t" '

(Atwo od 24). The freedom to choose to marr y or not, to choose to work o r not, tochoose to bea r children or not, has been replace d with the freedom from divorce,ban krup tcy, and abortion. Thu s, by eliminating a need for choice, the statecontrols individua l desires and d irects them into socially acceptable channels.As in the Un ited State of We, choice is the enem y of social har m on y in Gilead. Bycontrolling choice, citizens' freedoms a re controlled as we ll. The H an dm aid shav e also lost control of their bodies, an d, therefore, of their ide ntities.

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Brave New World: the Politics of C asteAldous Huxley also takes up the themes of freedom and identity in his

1932 dys topian nove l Brave New World. The W orld State in Brave New Worlddepends upon a highly stratified social structure implemented from the momentof conception. Reproduction has been completely mechanized and now fallssolely un de r the control of the World State. D uring the gestation period theem bryos travel in bottles along a conveyor belt throu gh a factory-like building ,and are con ditioned to belong to one of five castes: Alpha, Beta, Gamm a, D elta,or Epsilon. The Alpha em bryos are destined to become the leaders and think ersof the World State (and are predo min ately m ale). Each of the succeeding castesis conditioned to be slightly less physically and intellectually impressive. The

Epsilons, stunted and stupefied by oxygen deprivation and chemical treatments,are designed to perform men ial labor. The process of genetic conditioning alsodeterm ines on e's interests and h obbies, as well as one's sexual eligibility a ndability to consu me m aterial goods . The Deltas, for instance, are progra m m ed todislike book s and instead be docile, eager consum ers. Th roug h the caste system,M ustapha M ond and the other World Controllers have succeeded in removingstrong emotions and desires, and minimizing human relationships in society.

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Emotions and relationships typical of human societies have been replacedw ith the desire for food, sex, dru gs, and co nsum er go ods. Citizens areconditioned to desire only these World State-provided basics. Since hap pine ss isdictated by the imm ediate gratification of these desires, stability and socialharm ony a boun d. The technological interventions beginning at birth and lastinguntil death ens ure that the World State retains control by changing w hat peoplew an t and th en keeping the m superficially fulfilled.

The Predestinators estimate the need for various members of each caste,and the Hatch ery produc es hum an beings to match their mathem atical figures,following the economic rules of supply and d em and. The Predestinators rely ontwo processes of production: the Po dsn ap Process and the Bokanovsky Process.

The Pod sna p Process artificially s pee ds up the ripening of em byos, while th eBokanovsky Process arrests norm al hum an egg developm ent, allowing each eggto bu d and p rodu ce many identical eggs. Throug h the Pod snap and BokanovskyProcesses, the lower castes are mass-p rodu ced on assem bly lines to satisfy theneeds of the market, just l ike any other standa rdized, man ufactured good. TheWo rld State enacts the belief that hu m an beings a re things meant to be used untilthey break or we ar out.

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All ci t izens of Gilead are also controlled through the establishment of thecaste system . Th e final piece of the civil wa r, a regre ssive ca ste syste m, create ssocial c lasses by clear ly del ineat ing d i ffer ing s ta nd ard s for behavior , d res s , a ndsocial du t ie s . This s t r ic t po w er s t ructu re seeks to e l iminate unde si rab le c u l turalt rend s and bel iefs wh i le s imul tane ously co ntro l l ing a fearfu l and potent ia l lyreact ive pop ulace . This s t ra ti f icat ion leg i t imizes w ha t Chr is top her Jonesident if ies in h is ar t ic le "W om en of the Future: Al ternat ive S cenar ios" as a"hyper -p a t r i a rchy" in wh ich "m en rec la im har sh domina nce over wo me n" (3-4) .Jones accurately captures the psychological impetus for the Gi leadean takeover .

In Gi lead , women occupy the bot tom rung of the social ladder , re legatedto the dome s t i c per iphe ry . As Wives , Au n t s , H and ma ids , Mar tha s , Econowives

o r Widow s , w om en a re con f ined to the house ho ld , wi th on ly tw o a l t e rna t ives :ban ishm en t or prost i tu t ion . A nd tho ugh al l m en retain m ore social c lout thanwo me n, not a ll m en are equal ly powerfu l . M en too are const rained a ndvict imized by th is social system a nd i t s pur i tan ica l expectat ions . Thisv ict imizat ion i s m ore tangib le , d isp la yed in publ ic execu t ions for expres s ions ofsubvers ive behaviorrel ig ious , t reasonous, or sexual . Despi te th is , malesu l t imately occ upy posi t ions of greater pow er , re ta in m or e social f reedom, an dare provided more oppor tuni t ies for social mobi l i ty .

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As in Brave New World, the caste system in The Handmaid's Tale isostensibly utilized to simplify the lives of citizens and allow the m to m ore fullyenjoy their lives. The Aun ts have their ow n cache of propaga ndistic sayings,such as : "Wh y expect one wom an to carry out all the functions necessary to theserene runn ing of a house hold? It isn't reasonable or hu m an e" (A twood 163).Therefore, accord ing to the Au nts, the new social stratu m is liberating. But thisattitude, couched in pseudo-feminist sentiment, is the most insidious tool of thepatriarchy, a tool designed to convince wo me n that their subservience pro videsperso nal fulfillment and serves the comm on good.1984: Failed Political Resistance

Like Huxley's Brave New World and Zamatian's We, George Orwe ll's 1984is am ong the mo st powerful nov els of the dystopian genre. Orwell's vision of apost-atomic dictatorship in which e very individual w ould be ceaselesslymo nitored by m ean s of the telescreen seemed eerily proleptic in 1949, at th eda w n of the nuclear age and prior to the advent of television as a fixture in thefamily hom e. Tha t Orwell's fictive society is set a me re thirty-five ye ars into the

future e xacerbated the fears the novel generated . 1984 remains an importantnovel for the alarm it sou nds aga inst the abusive natu re of a uthoritariangove rnm ents a nd th e psychology of powe r as well as the implications of

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languag e and history. Most importan t to this discussion, howe ver, is Orw ell'sdepiction of love as a form of failed political resistance, illustrated in Winston'srelationship with Julia.

In Oceania the government monitors and controls every aspect of humanlift to the extent that even hav ing a disloyal thou ght is against the law.(Tho ughtcrim e is, in fact, the mo st serious of crimes.) As in Brave New World andWe, the gov ernm ent relies on citizens to spy on on e anothe r to ensure thema ndated social order, making genuine hum an relationships impossible.

As the novel progresses, the timidly rebellious Winston Smith sets ou t tochallenge the Party 's pow er, only to discover the terrifying extent to which it cancontrol and enslave citizens. One of the wa ys he resists the Party, the rulingentity of Oceania, is thro ug h his relationship w ith Julia, a co-worker from theMinistry of Truth. While Winston is concerned with larger social issues andconsum ed w ith the desire to join the resistance, Julia is sensual and pragm atic,conten t to live in the m om en t. Des pite their differences, W inston is sure Julia isthe only other pe rson w ho hates the Party and w ishes to rebel against it as mu ch

as he doe s.Julia and W inston carry on their relationship for several months an d are

finally betrayed wh en they m eet up w ith the suppo sed leader of the resistance

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the Bro therh ood wh o turn s ou t to be a spy and informer for the Par ty . Both arethen ta ken to the Minis t ry of Love to be in terrogated in Room 101. W i n s t o nbrea ks af ter being threatene d w i th rats , wh ich are h is speci fic phobia . H e begsthe officials to turn the rats on Julia instead . W insto n and Julia m ee t soon afterth is and d i scuss wha t happ ene d in Room 101:

An d perh aps you m igh t p re t end , a f t e rwards , t ha t i t w as on ly at r ick and tha t you jus t said it to ma ke the m stop a nd d idn ' t real lyme an i t. But that i sn ' t t rue. At the t ime w he n i t ha pp en s you dome an i t. You th ink there ' s no o ther way of sav ing yoursel f andyou ' re qui te read y to save yoursel f that w ay. You wa nt i t toha ppe n to the o ther per son . You don ' t give a da m n wh at theysuffer. All yo u care ab ou t is yourself. (158)

Ju l ia tel l s W insto n that she also bro ke an d begg ed th em to sh if t her to r ture toh im . Thei r acts of m utu al bet raya l represe nt the Par ty ' s final psy chologicalv ictory . Sel f -preservat ion takes prec ede nce ove r love. T he Pa r ty ha s pr ov en th atno moral convict ion or emot ional loyal ty i s s t rong enough to wi thstand tor ture .Physical pain a nd fear wi l l a lw ays ca use peop le to bet ray thei r convict ions ifdoin g so wi l l en d thei r suffering . The nove l end s on a note of des pai r as bo thWinston and Ju l ia are tor tured in to surrender ing to the power of the s ta te .

Simi lar ly , Offred subver ts Gi lead through heterosexual re lat ionships wi thm en of her hou seh old . The fi rs t, her i ll ic i t re la t ionship w i th the C om m an de r ,rem ove s the barr iers of ob jectiv ity that should se para te them . As Offred reflects

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after a series of late-night rendez vou s, "H e was no longer a thing to me. Thatwas the problem, and the realization has stayed with me. It complicates [...] Idon 't love the Com ma nde r or anything like it, but he 's of interest to me, heoccupies space, he is mo re than a sha dow . And I for him. To him I'm no longermerely a usable body" (Atwood 161-163). She can no longer dismiss him, just ashe can no longer control her . The balance of po w er ha s shifted, or so Offredassumes. Though his intentions are purely selfish, Offred does benefit from hisinterest. In his private space she is afforded mo re freedom as she readsmag azines from the past, plays Scrabble, and u ses ha nd lotion. Since readingand writing are strictly forbidden activities for women this experience isexhilara ting. The lotion is significant for Offred beca use it offers hop e of escape.The small act of pam per ing her skin leads Offred to imagine a future in w hichsomeone would again appreciate more than her potentially fecund ovaries. Heractivities are socially devian t, bu t they a re still controlled by the Commandersubject to his whim s and desires.

The Com ma nde r's Wife orchestrates Offred's relationship with Nick, with

the hope of Offred conceiving and therefore sparing the entire household fromsocial stigma. Their relationship becomes more than m erely another attem pt atpossible imp reg natio n. Offred falls in love w ith Nick. T his relations hip pro vid es

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deep fulfi l lment for Offred who believes "It 's lack of love we die from" (103).She suffers in Gilead , in part , becau se she has n o one to love. But this i ll icit lovecan only take place outs ide Gilead ' s dom est ic bou nda ries . There are s igns with inthe household of s tale "old love; there 's no other kind of love [. . . ] now" (103).Because of the ir bo nd and the chi ld they both ho pe she carr ies , Nick arra nge s forOffred's escape from Gilead. This becomes her final and most powerful act ofres is tance . I t i s, how ever , pro blem atic . Th oug h Nick help s her escape , love isno t necessar ily t r ium ph ant . We kn ow n othi ng of Offred 's fa te or the fa te of herun bo rn chi ld . I t i s unl ike ly tha t Offred and Nick ever saw one ano ther again .

Offred's resistance and escape are also problematic at the polit ical level.She forgoes opportuni t ies to spy on the Commander for the May Day res is tancebecause she fears jeopa rdiz ing h er re la t ionship w ith Nick. F inal ly , he r escape ismotivated by self-preservation rather than a desire to affect social change orsolicit public outcry against Gilead. Like Serena Joy and the Aunts, Offred ist ruly complic i t in her own oppress ion.Conc lus ion

M a rg a re t A t w o o d ' s The Handm aid's Tale employs ma jor t ropes and themesof Utopian an d dy s top ian l i te ra ture . In her ar t ic le "H ow C an a Fem inis t Read TheHandmaid's Tale" Tae Yamamoto a rgues tha t

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this reciprocal gaze betw een the prese nt and the past gives [TheHandmaid's Tale] a twofold func tion. It is a cau tiona ry tale, inwhich the reader, watching the extrapolated, exaggerated ho rrorsof the nea r future, is wa rne d against any potential for those evils inour o w n time . It also functions as a satire on our o wn society, inwh ich are ow n habits and lifestyles are de-familiarized andcriticized thr ou gh being observe d from th e point of view of anoutsider. (197)

Instead of creating merely a warning, or merely a satire, Atwood expertly blendsboth into a satirical war ning . She criticizes the autocracy of Gilead and thesecular consum erist culture that preceded it. As an examination of the autocratictendencies of such a culture Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale warns against self-propagated oppression.

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Chapter 4Women Disunited: The Matriarchy of Gilead

"It's har d to imag ine now , hav ing a friend" (A twood 25).

The previous chapters explored h ow The Handmaid's Tale was inspired bySecond-W ave Feminism and the genre of speculative fiction. Inde ed, blen dingthese elements was the genesis for Atwood's portrayal in The Handmaid's Tale ofthe disunity of women, and the consequent destruction of female solidarity.

Preying on the social confusion and unrest stemming from the Women'sLiberation movement, the patriarchy of Gilead isolates women and thenrelegates them to the domestic per iphe ry. Reacting to the increasingly strained

gen der relations of the liberal Ame rican cu lture that prece ded it, the Repub lic ofGilead eme rges as the new nation state. In Gilead, all me n are not created equal:some m en are second-class citizens and all w om en are third-class citizens. To besuccessful, the patriarc hy of Gilead mu st re-assert male dom inance . W om en areseen as potentially threatening and subversive, and, therefore, require strictcontrol. They are bann ed from em ployme nt and then forbidden to ow n pro pertyor access assets, rendering th em virtual prisoners within their hom es. Wom en'simprisonment paves the way for Gilead's institution of a caste system, which, as

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previously discussed, is superficial ly designed to simplify the l ives of ci t izens bydiv id ing them in to classes wi th clear ly del ineated s tandards for behavior , d ress ,an d responsib i l i t ies . Ho we ver , as in a l l dys topia n societ ies , th is cas te system isactual ly a too l of oppre ss ion , par t icu lar ly for w om en .

The result of the micro-strat if ication in Gilead is the evolution of a newform of misog yny, no t as w e usual ly th ink of it , as men ' s hat red of w om en, bu t aswo me n ' s ha t red of wo me n . Thus , i n The Handmaid's Tale, Atwood dep ic t s oneviable backlash f rom our curren t feminis t momentum: gynocentr ic misogynyand " t rad i t ional" misogyny combined in one mi l i tar i s t ic socio-rel ig ious order .The pat r iarch y of Gi lead es tab l ishes a matr iarch al netw ork re sponsib le forregula t ing w om en thro ug h enforcing the d iv is ion of dom est ic labor . Thema tr iarchal ne tw ork e nsure s that , as Pat r ic ia Goldb lat t po in ts ou t in her ar t ic le"Recons t ruc ting Margare t Atwo od ' s P ro tagon i s t s ," " the wo rk wom en doconspi res to ma in tain th e subject ion of thei r ow n k in d" (4) . The ep i log ue of thenove l re-aff irms the pur po se of the matr iarch y: " the best an d m ost cost-effectiveway to con t ro l women fo r r ep roduc t ive and o ther pu rposes was th rough women

themse lve s" (Atwood 308 ). T h i s com me n t em phas ize s the impo r t ance of t hema tr iarchy both for es tab l i sh ing an d main tain ing the ne w social o rde r . Byrely ing on wom en to sel f- regulate , the foun ders of Gi lead successfu l ly dest roy

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female so l idar i ty . The re are tw o so da l system s in w hich th is dy sfunct ionalmat r i a rchy i s en fo rced : t he H an dm aid t r a in ing sys tem and the house ho ld . Thesetwo systems i l lus t rate the publ ic and pr ivate enforcement of the matr iarchy .

Handmaids are the crux of Gi lead ' s surv ival , paradoxical ly the mostvalued , yet most despised caste . They are charged wi th revers ing theplu m m et i ng b i r thra te , a v i ta l miss ion fo l lowing a n age of readi ly avai lab le b i r thcon t ro l, i r r espons ib le mana gem en t o f nuc lear was te and chemica l we apo nry , andindiscr im inate use of agr icu l tura l chemicals . After being arres ted forpar t i c ipa t ing in non - t r ad i t iona l r e l a t ionsh ips ( second o r comm on- law mar r i ages ,or o ther ex t ra-mari ta l l ia isons) , the Handmaids are then turned over to the Auntsfor t ra in ing .

At the Rachel and Leah Re-educat ion Centers (a lso known as the RedCen te r s ) , t he Aun t s indoc t r ina t e the H and m aid s in the mat r i a rchy o f Gi l ead . TheAu n t s a re en t ru s t ed w i th the c rucia l du ty of t ra in ing the H and m aid s becausethey rank am on g the mo st pow erfu l female agen ts of the pat r iarcha l orde r . Infu ll co l lus ion wi th the male lead ers of Gi lead , the A unts s to p at no th ing to

subdue and domes t i ca t e the Handmaids du r ing the i r i n i t i a t ion .In the first scene of the nove l Off red rem em be rs on e of her f irst nigh ts at

the Red Cen te r : " the li gh t s w ere tu rne d do w n bu t no t ou t . A un t Sara an d A un t

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Elizabeth patrolled; they ha d electric cattle pro ds slun g on tho ngs from theirbelts" (4). In the semi-darkness of what was formerly a high school gymnasium,Offred and the other Handmaids-in-training mourn their lost culture, their lostlives, their lost freedom, and their lost selves. They are no w a national resourceto be protected and regulated. The Ha ndm aids have lost their hum anity; theyare now nothing m ore than potentially productive ovaries.

How ever, by calling the Ha ndm aids "sacred vessels" and "amb ulatorychalices" the Aunts attempt to imbue their mission and status with honor (136).Indeed, the Aun ts try to convince the Hand m aids tha t Gilead has actuallyrestored respect for wom en, wh o are now valued and appreciated because theyare "holding the future in their han ds" (55). The Aun ts represent themselves as

motherly m entors to the Han dm aids, guides on the path to successfulassimilation into Gilead. They prese nt the mission of Gilead as: "W om en u nitedfor a common end! Helping one another in their daily chores as they walk thepa th of life together, each perform ing he r appo inted ta sk" (162). A un t Lydia'spe p talk on solidarity is disturbingly ironic in the context of the society it claimsto represent. The caste system is no t liberating. It is an insidiou s mech anism ofthe patriarchy, designed to convince wom en tha t their subservience p rovidesperso nal fulfillment an d serves the com mo n good. A un t Lydia justifies her

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mission to Offred's group, "I 'm doing my best [ . . . ] I 'm trying to give you the bestchance you can ha ve " (55). T he "bes t chan ce" the A unt s can prov ide theHandmaids i s in t imida t ion th rough bra inwash ing , humi l ia t ion , and to r tu re .

As pa r t of a b ra inw ash ing cam pa ign , the Ha ndm aids a re d rugg ed in tocom placence and forced to wa tch por no grap hic mov ies . T hese f i lms , am on g theAunts favored tools , depic t many sexual ly degrading and violent ac ts agains two m en . In a part icular ly dis tu rbing f i lm, as Offred recoun ts , "w e ha d to wa tch aw om an bein g s lowly cut to pieces , her f ingers and breas ts snipp ed off w i thgar de n shears , her s tomach spl i t op en and he r in tes t ines pul le d ou t" (118). A un tLydia uses th is f ilm to i l lus t ra te the disdain m en previou s ly held for w om en .Accord ing to Au nt Lydia , w om en we re mere ly bod ies fo r men to use and abuse

as the y ple ased . This is ironic on tw o levels . First, this att i t ud e echoes th esent im ents of man y Second-W ave Feminis ts wh o saw me n's objec ti f ica tion ofw om en as the pr im ary source of the socia l opp ress ion of w om en. Second, theAu nts a re cha rged wi th con t ro l ling the H and m aid s fo r the pa t r i a rchy . Theleaders of Gi lead view the Han dm aid s merely as bod ies to be used for the g oodof the nat ion. The patr iarchy has twis ted a prom ine nt feminist prem ise into atool tha t enables women to oppress each other .

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Within the confines of the Red Center, abuse is p redom inatelypsychological. Humiliation is a favorite technique of the Aunts. Janine, anotherHan dm aid-in-training, rep eatedly suffers public hum iliation. For instance, anA un t refuses to allow her a restroo m bre ak so she soils herself in front of thegro up. On an other occasion, Janine is bullied into admitting she enticed the me nwh o gang rape d her, resulting in the abortion that marred h er teenage years.Au nt Lydia condem ns Janine, and all wo m en w ho m ad e spectacles of themselvesby "oiling themselves like roasted meat on a spit, [revealing their] bare backs andshoulders, on the street, in public," and showing their legs witho ut stockings(53). For A un t Lydia, the sexual freedom wo m en struggled to attain during pre-Gilead times was the source of their victimization. Women foolishly flauntedtheir bodies, tem ping m en to sexual violence. An imm odest wo m an is punishedby G od, according to A un t Lydia, to "teach her a lesson. Teach her a lesson. Teachher a lesson" (72, em phasis autho r's). According to the Aunts, as spokeswo menfor the patriarchy of Gilead, rape and other forms of sexual and domesticviolence are consequences of wom en possessing sexual freedom and leading

men on.If psychological avenues are unsuccessful, the Aunts use physical violence

to control the wo m en in their charge. Offred recounts a few instances of

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violence . H er fr iend Moira , a mil i tant lesbian she kn

women disunited - margaret atwoods the handmaids tale as a crit

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