Another postmodernism technique Atwood applies to her novel is this idea of a parody. Atwood attempts to make fun of all the critics who say, “Only historians can have true accounts of the past,” by creating this novel that contains several reconstructed personal versions of historical events. Even though an historian might have been a witness to a certain event, it doesn’t mean this historian’s account will be totally true. They might leave out some details or even add details that didn’t even happen, just to make their version of the events sound better. It is impossible for a person to catch every exact detail of what happened even if they are witnesses. Witnesses place their own reactions and feelings into their accounts and basically shape
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The story within a story within a story structure of this novel leaves the reader with questions throughout, which is what Atwood intended to do. This book holds back on a lot of information until the very end, leaving the audience unsure at many points throughout the text. Atwood manipulates readers by using various literary devices and tries to let the audience develop their own perspectives. Since no two people are the same and no two people will interpret a novel in the same way, Atwood creates a novel that leads to lots of different interpretations. The big postmodernism technique Atwood uses is historiographic metafiction. She takes literary devices and combines them with historical events to show how accounts of history are reconstructed in the modern era. With the belief that it is impossible for someone to have a clear cut account of the past unless they were there, Atwood goes against this belief and has Iris recreate her own account of family history. Iris reconstructs her family’s history from her point of view and places her own feelings and opinions into it. The way the audience takes in Atwood’s writing will vary as not everyone will catch on to everything. Some people will have trust in the characters throughout, while others will not. Atwood’s novel is a work that makes deciding between truth and fiction difficult and it depicts the ideal aspects of postmodernism like, unreliable narrators, science fiction, and
The story within a story within a story structure of this novel leaves the reader with questions throughout, which is what Atwood intended to do. This book holds back on a lot of information until the very end, leaving the audience unsure at many points throughout the text. Atwood manipulates readers by using various literary devices and tries to let the audience develop their own perspectives. Since no two people are the same and no two people will interpret a novel in the same way, Atwood creates a novel that leads to lots of different interpretations. The big postmodernism technique Atwood uses is historiographic metafiction. She takes literary devices and combines them with historical events to show how accounts of history are reconstructed in the modern era. With the belief that it is impossible for someone to have a clear cut account of the past unless they were there, Atwood goes against this belief and has Iris recreate her own account of family history. Iris reconstructs her family’s history from her point of view and places her own feelings and opinions into it. The way the audience takes in Atwood’s writing will vary as not everyone will catch on to everything. Some people will have trust in the characters throughout, while others will not. Atwood’s novel is a work that makes deciding between truth and fiction difficult and it depicts the ideal aspects of postmodernism like, unreliable narrators, science fiction, and