0 “The Handmaid's Tale" By Margaret Atwood

Summary and response about the chapter 1-6 of the novel " The handmaid's tale" by Margaret Atwood.

The novel the Handmaid’s Tale written by Margaret Atwood is one of the classical novels that have enhanced the feminist view. This paper aims to provide an insight to the first six chapters of the novels. This paper shall also include my response regarding the story. The analysis of the first six chapters of the book will allow understanding with the narration of protagonist and also the main goal of the authors for adopting a feminist approach in writing.

The narration in the first six chapters of the novel is introductory of the location where the protagonist and other women are staying. The narrator and protagonist of the novel is Offred who seems to narrate her story through the aid of flashbacks. The story’s progress is smooth as the narration has been done in a gradual manner. This has allowed readers like me to grasp the idea of the background as well as the plot of the novel. In the first chapter, the narrator speaks of her experience and other women in the gymnasium as, “We slept in what had once been the gymnasium. The floor was of varnished wood, with striped and circles painted on it, for the games that were formerly played there; the loops or the basketball nets wee still in place, though the nets were gone (Atwood 5).” The narrator talks about the fear of women to be used by men if they were given considered pretty looking to them. The narrator has informed the audiences that women were commodities of entertainment to the foreigners and they were not allowed to speak aloud. This fact comes to observation when the narrator speaks that, “in the army cots that had bee set up in rows, with spaces between so we could not talk…Elizabeth patrol with electric cattle prod hanging from their leather belts (Atwood 6).”

The narrator progresses in the second chapter of the novels where the scenic description of Offred’s location suddenly changes into a separate room. The narrator describes the room to have a door that never closes completely, a framed picture, a bed, a glass of water on the table, curtains on the windows and braided rug. The description of the room of Offred proves to be a commercial living location. Offred illustrates herself as a handmaid who is not supposed to talk to the wives and Marthas. The narrator has rather explained the uniforms of the handmaids, wives and Marthas to be red, blue and green respectively. This account of the novel rather shows the aspect of women being slaves of the army. Offred leaves from her room to go for shopping as she states “I never looked good in red, it’s not my color, I pick up the shopping basket, put it over my arm (Atwood 7).” This states that Offred is a handmaid who wears red uniform and is not allowed to talk to Marthas and wives but secretly she talked to Rita who is a Martha which is evident from the following narration. Offred narrates that “Rita sees me and nods, whether in greeting or in simple acknowledgment of my presence it’s hard to say, and wipes her floury hands on her apron and rummages in the kitchen drawer for the token book. Frowning, she tears out three tokens and hands them to me (Atwood 9).”

The third chapter of the novel rather talks about the role of the wives of the commanders. These wives were of the commanders who have been assigned the work of knitting scarves for the front angels in the army. The wives of the commander had a garden and access to coffees cigarettes and alcohol. The narrator has been shown to express her curiosity regarding the roles of the wives and wonders if their knitted scarves have ever been used because she believed it was just a work to make the wives stay busy (Atwood).

The fourth chapter of the novel takes the readers to a much interesting aspect of the novel where men have been described to be on service such as Nick who cleans the car of commander and winks Offred as she walks outside to meet the other handmaid as they have to go for shopping in a pair as evident from the following quote, “He takes a final puff of the cigarettes, its top to the driveway, and steps on it. He begins to whistle. Then he winks (Atwood 18)”. Secondly, she Offred has also been shown to flirt with the young fanatics who were too young to be a part of the army but known as guardians. This shows the readers that men were greatly desperate to have sex with the women as they were not allowed to masturbate or fantasize with the help of pornography. They were not even permitted to marry women till the time they became angels. In this chapter, handmaid has been used as the first by the author (Atwood).

The narrator has talked about the power self control related to men. The narrator says that she been to the city for shopping where she noticed that the sign boards of the shop did not display texts as people believed that the texts is able to persuade sexual desires among men. It is for this reason that pictures have been displayed instead of texts in the signboard (Atwood).

The sixth chapter talks about the puritans and colonial era effects that were preserved in the museum where Offred along with the other handmaid been to view the remains of the colonial culture. The above chapters of the novel allow the readers to understand how army men treated women and they were mere source of service for them. The fear of being sexually used was the only thing women had to think about as men were desperate. The respect of women was linear and that is why they were deprived of their rights. The novel has proved to enhance the disrepute that has been given to women over the years by army men. The story told by the narrator is a self experience which allows us to take a trip to their complicated lives.

 Works Cited

Atwood, Margaret. Handmaids Tale. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1986.