Table of contentsIntroductionSuppression of the female voice in the society of GileadConclusionIntroduction“Despite the strict patriarchal structure of Gilead, it is ultimately the female voice that wins in the end. »Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why violent video games should not be banned"? Get an original essay One of the main features of Margret Atwood's "The Handmaid's Tale" and its sequel "The Testaments" is the strong feminist message that Atwood communicates through them. . Despite how strongly we see the manifestation and control of the patriarchal structure of Gileadian society, the female voice that permeates the story is ultimately the force that prevails. The women of Gilead are oppressed in every way possible, including rape and violence. the ceremonial confiscation of their reproductive rights. This is seen through Gilead's deeply biblical and sexist views on reproduction and sexuality, particularly as they relate to women. Atwood uses a metaphor comparing women (specifically servants) to containers and their fertility as the contents of the container: "We are containers, it's only the inside of our bodies that is important. » The servant while being looked down upon by many wives and even by the daughters of Gilead, as shown by the Shunamite's approach to them in the tale of Agnes "They pass it on until they have a baby . They're all sluts anyway, they don't need real names. ", they are also treated as sacred vessels because they hold the capacity to produce the future generation of Gilead. However, the divide between fertility and personality is highlighted in Janine's birth ceremony, where Janine's commander's wife pretends to give birth at the same time, and the fake birth is treated like the genuine one. The Handmaids are completely deprived of motherhood. They do not have the right to keep the children they give birth to; instead, their reproductive potential becomes their means of survival. They are also prohibited from reading and writing, a restriction that deprives women of any chance to write their own history. This loss of literary awareness and power is visible in both novels, first in the family reunion in The Handmaid's Tale, "The Bible is kept under lock and key...He can read it to us, but we cannot read ". The reader can see this again in the story of Agnes in The Testaments, as we see that not only are women forbidden to read, but they are also educated to believe that men are the only ones capable of the act itself: “It was a talent that women had. because of their special brain, which was not hard and concentrated like the brains of men but soft and moist, warm and enveloping.” This underscores Atwood's special warning to women writers, historians, and artists. In a patriarchal society that has become radical and violent, the female voice will be stifled. This strict enforcement of gender roles and norms can lead women to have an inferior view of their own capabilities; creating an underdeveloped sense of self and inhibiting their ability to defend themselves. Atwood challenges this view, however, demonstrating how the female voice refuses to be stifled, fights back, and ultimately becomes the thing that destroys Gilead. Suppression of the female voice in the society of Gilead literature. Most dystopian novels depict totalitarian societies in which freedom is strictly limited or even non-existent. Jelena Živić argued that "Offred's story is similar toclassic slave narrative… As in the classic slave narrative, the handmaids are enslaved by the dominant minority – the commanders. » The most common way to show the reader Gilead's control over the female voice throughout the story. both novels go through their manipulation of language itself. We first see this through the removal of the names of the handmaids. The Commander and his wife only accept Offred for her proven fertility, and they even rename her as Fred's possession; rather, they are designated by the name of the commander they serve, the functions of their body are valued, but their personality is not: “My name is not Offred, I have another name, which no one 'use now because it's forbidden. This shows how much Offred's characterization of herself was influenced. Due to the fact that she is constantly degraded and monitored, she believes that personal information, even her name, is irrelevant. This quote proves that this society corrupts the handmaids', and by extension all women's, opinions of themselves. In Offred's case, we see that her personality, mostly strong and resilient, has been replaced by self-awareness and vulnerability. This control of free speech leads Offred to present a fragmented narrative, with regular flashbacks to a time when she felt like she had some semblance of autonomy in her life. We also see this through Gilead's enforcement of the use of religious language among the people. the Handmaids, "Blessed be the fruit...the greeting accepted among us." This suppresses their freedom of expression, leaving no room for thoughts of rebellion or injustice, maintaining theocratic and patriarchal dictatorship. This restriction of language brainwashes those in the lower ranks of Gileadean society, i.e. women, allowing commanders to maintain control. Atwood wrote the novel shortly after the elections of Ronald Reagan in the United States and Margaret Thatcher in Britain, during a period of conservative revival in the West, fueled in part by a strong and well-organized movement of religious conservatives who criticized what they perceived as the excesses of the "sexual revolution" of the 1960s and 1970s. The growing power of this "religious right" increased feminist fears that the gains made by women in previous decades would be reversed and that the female voice is thus silenced. However, ultimately Gilead is unable to fully control the minds of those it oppresses. We see many points in the novel where Offred attempts to assert her individuality in modest ways, never succumbing to or fully accepting the identity that has been imposed on her. First, she refuses to say “my” room and later, when she says “mine,” she asserts her right to do so: “There must finally be a space that I claim as mine. This is also seen when she goes down the stairs to steal a dead flower – an almost completely unnecessary gesture, but one that affirms her sense of individuality and reminds her of "what I could do once." With just a first-person perspective or three, we can also see that Gilead can't control the minds of its women in the long run either. This change reflects the growing power of the female voice within Gilead itself, as well as its refusal to submit to patriarchal control. 30 years after the publication of The Handmaid's Tale, social uprisings are increasing to defend the rights of oppressed groups such as the #BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo movements. These help to contextualize the more actively rebellious role assumed bycharacters like Aunt Lydia and Nicole and help explain the more action-packed, thriller-type narrative seen in The Testaments. Another primary way in which the patriarchal system of Gilead works to suppress the female voice is through isolation. We see that this is done not only physically, but also emotionally and socially. Each woman in Gilead is ranked according to a rigid hierarchy, with different uniforms, colors, and specific names to denote their role within the state organization. Without clothing choices, differences in individual appearance are minimized and differences between groups are accentuated: “Marthas are not supposed to fraternize with us.” A great example of this in the novel is Offred's isolation in the house as she spends much of her time alone in her room, even having to eat her meals separately from the rest of the house. By separating women in almost every way and forcing them to feel different from each other. They feel alone and isolated, unable to stand up against oppression on their own, preferring to be pitted against each other, as evidenced by the Marthas' obsession with gossip: "They are very interested in how other households are managed; such gossip gives them the opportunity to be proud or unhappy. This serves to contrast with what the Testaments show us. Atwood shows us how the women of Gilead, that is, Aunt Lydia and Offred's two daughters, come together to cooperate despite their vast differences and ultimately bring about the downfall of Gilead's patriarchal system. Many would say that the growth of women's rights movements today, such as the Women's March and #MeToo, have heavily influenced Atwood in this way, showing how women today are coming together to form a united front against injustice. Another way we see much of patriarchal control. Gilead exerts influence on the female characters through their indoctrination, using shame, fear and repression, as shown in the character of Agnes. We see that throughout her childhood and schooling, the language used by characters such as Aunt Vidala and Aunt Estée is designed to reinforce the idea of ​​maintaining innocence and purity, "we were precious flowers" . Much of Agnes' education, as we see it, is based on reinforcing and emphasizing notions such as these. This indoctrination distorts the worldview of all women raised in Gilead, they will believe that the patriarchy exercised over them plays a positive role, protecting them from their own destructive influence, "we were the innocent and blameless causes who, by our nature even, could make men drink with lust. The tendency of Agnes's storytelling is often this mixture of biblical, almost Old Testament language, with more modern, gentler language. This gives the reader almost a feeling of sarcasm and mockery towards Gilead's ways. Agnes' voice often echoes that of Offred. She demonstrates how the female voice survives within the system where it is powerless, and how, despite the system's attempts to stifle and deprive women of their individuality, to indoctrinate them, they are able to become aware and fight against the injustice of total patriarchy. We see this through Agnes' frustration and fear at being denied her basic right to make choices that affect her life. As a young girl, Agnes watches her family's servant, Ofkyle, die in childbirth. As Agnes' family and the doctor congratulate Ofkyle for making the "ultimate sacrifice" and dying with a "noble female honor,” Agnes is deeply disturbed, because Ofkyle’s death was not something she chose. Agnes's repulsion and deep sympathy for the Handmaid suggests that it is not even Ofkyle's death, but her complete inability to choose whether she lives or not, that constitutes the greatest injustice imposed on her as a as a woman. However, I would argue that it serves to bring some balance to the narrative, often sounding defensive about Gilead: "I hope you will also remember that we all have a certain nostalgia for the kindness we knew as 'children ". She balances the very critical and negative view that all the other narrators have of Gilead. Agnes does indeed admit that she liked the central idea of ​​Gilead and supported its original core ideals (I would argue that this would be mainly due to the indoctrination the reader saw throughout her childhood), but that she fought against the deep corruption that had plagued the system and oppressed women for years. the gain of greedy men. I would say it's Agnes' feminine voice that shines through, even though she had love during her early years, she refused to be oppressed and desired freedom. Nicole almost fulfills the opposite function to that of her sister. She also echoes Offred, her mother, in that she actively chooses the path of rebellion against the state. We see this active role strongly emphasized throughout the novel as Nicole actively engages in the only violence we see perpetrated by a female character in the novels outside of the "participations" in which the Handmaids participate, "Nicole did something with his fist. » .she hit Aunt Vidala in the chest. She also engages in subterfuge and secret rebellions, like all the other narrators we see in Atwood's choice to give her multiple names throughout the story, Daisy, Nicole, and Jade. She serves to demonstrate how moving away from the totalitarian control of the patriarchal state can allow the female voice to flourish and become powerful, as evidenced by her almost complete refusal to project too much of an outward facade of conformity. but these attempts will not last long. " However, I would say that even Nicole, who grew up in an open and democratic society in Canada and has much more power to make her own decisions, finds that sometimes she too is having little choice in major decisions. of her life, especially as she is drawn into external events that are far beyond her control, "I somehow agreed to go to Gilead without ever being definitively of agreement ". Nicole's apparent lack of choice in a decision that could change irreversibly or even cost her life is comparable to Handmaid Ofkyle's lack of choice in whether she or her baby lives. This complicates the concept of choice, since Nicole's unchosen task is the best hope of defeating Gilead's regime, suggesting that an individual may sometimes need to put aside their own personal action for the good of all, which, in Nicole's case, will unleash the power. Women have patriarchal control exercised by Gilead and allow them all to exercise their own free will. Aunt Lydia's narrative in The Testaments contrasts sharply with the way Atwood characterizes her throughout The Handmaid's Tale. Throughout the previous novel, the role played by Aunt Lydia and the other aunts in keeping the handmaids going was very ironic. Aunt Lydia seemed to be an archetype of power and oppressive control within Gilead. Gilead used her and other women they selected for power to ensure total oppression of.