Offreds Narrative Technique in The Handmaids Tale Essay -- Handmaid

Offred affects every single aspect of The Handmaids Tale, so, in order to understand her narrative technique better, her character must also be considered. Offred is nostalgic, she longs for her pre-Gilead past with which she still identifies very strongly. She is, however, realistic in her longing she knows that the past was not perfect, that it was no utopia, but she just longs for a situation preferable to her face up one, ...We lived, as usual, by ignoring.... Another strong reason for to long for the past is that she was basically happy there, she had a daughter and a lover, both of which she was removed from by the Gilead regime. Her longing for the past is bittersweet, although it has many memories for her, not all of them are happy. Also, whenever she thinks of the past, she is reminded of how awful her present situation is, she is reminded of what she has lost. Perhaps that is why she refers to the past as ...the other time.... She is also a fighter. She is determined t o survive, to last through Gilead, no matter what it takes. The important distinction here is between survival and rebellion Offred will only go so far in defiance of the regime, while she is prepared to stretch the rules with an insignificant Guardian on the road into the town, she limits herself, describing it as ....a small defiance of rule....like the glaze I hoarded, as a child... When it comes to serious defiance, she draws a definite line, No. I cant she says when the doctor offers to impregnate her, The penalty is death. Perhaps that is what Offred is really unnerved of. Death is her real fear. In order to keep herself sane, Offred has invented several survival mechanisms, games w... ...ve technique. Works Cited and ConsultedAtwood, Margaret. The Handmaids Tale. Anchor Books New York, New York, 1985.Conboy, Sheila C. Scripted, Conscripted, and Circumscribed Body Language in Margaret Atwoods The Handmaids Tale. Anxious Power Reading, Writing, and Ambivalence in Narra tive by Women. Eds. Carol J. Singley and Susan Elizabeth Sweeney. Albany State U of New York P, 1993. 349-62 Fitting, Peter. The Turn from Utopia in Recent libber Fiction. Feminism, Utopia, and Narrative. Eds. Libby Falk Jones and Sarah Webster Goodwin. Knoxville U of Tennessee P, 1990. 141-158. Garlick, Barbara. The Handmaids Tale Narrative Voice and the Primacy of the Tale. Twentieth-Century Fantasists Essays on Culture, Society and Belief in Twentieth-Century Mythopoeic Literature. Ed. Kath Filmer. New York St. Martins, 1992. 161-71.