Binge-worthy Books: The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
- Elise
- Jun 17, 2022
- 2 min read
Updated: Oct 25, 2022
Welcome to Binge-worthy Books, where we review the title for that month's edition of our new Streaming Book Club, a book club around those titles that were later turned into hot new streaming shows or movies. So sit back and relax. We're getting ready to binge another book: The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood.
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The Handmaid's Tale
by Margaret Atwood
Book Summary
The Handmaid's Tale is a novel of such power that the reader will be unable to forget its images and its forecast. Set in the near future, it describes life in what was once the United States and is now called the Republic of Gilead, a monotheocracy that has reacted to social unrest and a sharply declining birthrate by reverting to, and going beyond, the repressive intolerance of the original Puritans. The regime takes the Book of Genesis absolutely at its word, with bizarre consequences for the women and men in its population.
The story is told through the eyes of Offred, one of the unfortunate Handmaids under the new social order. In condensed but eloquent prose, by turns cool-eyed, tender, despairing, passionate, and wry, she reveals to us the dark corners behind the establishment’s calm façade, as certain tendencies now in existence are carried to their logical conclusions. The Handmaid's Tale is funny, unexpected, horrifying, and altogether convincing. It is at once scathing satire, dire warning, and a tour de force. It is Margaret Atwood at her best. -- Publisher Description
The Hulu Series: The Handmaid's Tale
A stark world with rigid boundaries reminiscent of the Puritans if the Puritans went a few miles further (or took some lessons from other ultraconservative religious doctrines) and severe issues of infertility threatening the whole world often compared to that of The Before (our complicated modern world with women in the workplace, gender and sexual politics, global warming, social media, and all the host of other concepts and complications that make up our every day life. Meet Offred, handmaid to a rich and powerful commander in the new world order. Forced into service as breeding stock to the all-powerful, ripped from family and friends, and now she must make a choice, one of the few given her: Will she go along with this new world order or will she fight back?
Discussion Questions
Included are the official Penguin Random House discussion questions as well as my original show questions. Simply click on the list you want to explore.
Official Book Questions
The novel begins with three epigraphs. What are their functions?
In Gilead, women are categorized as wives, handmaids, Marthas, or Aunts, but Moira refuses to fit into a niche. Offred says she was like an elevator with open sides who made them dizzy; she was their fantasy. Trace Moira's role throughout the tale to determine what she symbolizes.
Aunt Lydia, Janine, and Offred's mother also represent more than themselves. What do each of their characters connote? What do the style and color of their clothes symbolize?
At one level, The Handmaid's Tale is about the writing process. Atwood cleverly weaves this sub-plot into a major focus with remarks by Offred such as "Context is all, " and "I've filled it out for her," "I made that up," and "I wish this story were different." Does Offred's habit of talking about the process of storytelling make it easier or more difficult for you to suspend disbelief?
A palimpsest is a medieval parchment that scribes attempted to scrape clean and use again, though they were unable to obliterate all traces of the original. How does the new republic of Gilead's social order often resemble a palimpsest?
The Commander in the novel says you can't cheat nature. How do characters find ways to follow their natural instincts?
Why is the Bible under lock and key in Gilead?
Babies are referred to as "a keeper, "unbabies, " "shredders." What other real or fictional worlds do these terms suggest?
Atwood's title brings to mind titles from Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales. Why might Atwood have wanted you to make that connection?
What do you feel the "Historical Notes" at the book's end add to the reading of this novel? What does the book's last line mean to you?
Unofficial Show Questions
In the book, the Handmaid Offred is never officially named. Why do you think it was so important to name June? Where do you fall on the fandom discussion? Do you believe her name really is June? Why do you think the book stayed away from revealing her name while the show insisted? Is there a difference between mediums?
The book starts with handmaids already captured and in the converted school sleeping in the gymnasium while the show starts before that with her flight from Gilead soldiers with her family. Why do you think they did this? How did this more action-filled start affect your understanding of the story?
Atwood has stated that she does not see this as a work of feminism, that everything in her book was taken from reality (as in similar events have happened throughout history). How do you see her novel? Do you think the series did a fair interpretation of her work?
Many of the characters in the Hulu production of The Handmaid's Tale have been made to know each other before Gilead even if they didn't before. Why do you think this is? Does this expand or shrink their world?
There are some extreme reactions out there to just about all of the major, and a few of the minor characters in the show. What are some of your reactions to the characters?
One of the points that has been made is how Luke's passivity in the leadup to the rise of Gilead helps to illustrate "how when people let their rights slowly slip away it can result in something like Gilead", and by extension any of a number of atrocities and tyrannies like Nazi Germany,
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