Margaret Atwood

experienced. This claim that narratives are influenced by experience can be detected in the work of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid's Tale (1985) and Omar Musa’s Capital Letters (2013), where both composers demonstrate the importance of narrative and its ability to…

Genesis,“Behold my maid Bilhah, go in unto her; and she shall bear upon my knees, that I may also have children by her”( Genesis 30:1-2). In the beginning of the novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood introduces her book with five different quotes. Every quote relates to what is going to occur in the novel. Atwood uses this quote at the beginning of the novel to foreshadow that certain characters in the novel will be forced to fulfill certain roles. In the novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, the…

Did she really do it? That was the major conflict in the novel, Alias Grace, by Margaret Atwood. The novel is based around 23 year old Grace Marks who has been in a penitentiary in Toronto since she was 16 years old for the murder of Thomas Kinnear and his housekeeper Nancy Montgomery. Did she really do it commit the murders though as everyone believes she had? That’s the conflict that builds the tension in the novel. According to Grace she did not commit the murders. It was the stable hand Mr.…

statement has a disconcerting level of truth. The inevitability of one’s death brings with it a sense of lack of control over one’s life. That is not a desirable sensation, but it is one that is all too familiar in the novel, Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. The protagonist of the novel a man whose name was Jimmy in his youth, but is now called Snowman. Throughout his life as Jimmy, he was often told indirectly, even by himself, that he would die, that death was the only thing that would…

“Death of a Young Son by Drowning” by Margaret Atwood tells the very vivid story of a mother’s son’s death. The tone used by the author was reflective, happy, and yet still sorrowful. Atwood sort of describes the son’s death as an adventure, giving the poem a happy and optimistic tone. She uses words that make it seem almost like a journey, for instance in line 4 she uses “voyage,” in line 25 “long trip,” and line 13 “reckless adventurer,” that make it seem almost exciting. There is also a shift…

possession. The dependency that young daughters have on fathers affects their mindsets, self-esteem, and futures. In the book, Best of the Best American Poetry, a handful of the poems express the avid role of fathers in a person’s life. According to Margaret Atwood, the sonnet “Bored” portrays the regret and remembrance a young daughter has for her deceased father and shows how she realizes being bored with her father is better than not having his presence at all. Unlike the poem “Bored,”…

Dystopian novels can depict a society that conveys one’s fears, or what could potentially happen in the future. Margaret Atwood’s book, The Handmaid’s Tale, shows a world where women are degraded and stripped of their freedom. The work of literature portrays many themes as the protagonist, Offred, travels through the dystopia. She learns to stay silent and follow every command given to her. Atwood takes her readers through the fundamentalist views of Gilead and the misogynistic views of the…

Tale, religion is poorly portrayed. The Gilead regime is oppressive and violent which leads readers to question the intentions of the author, Margaret Atwood. While Atwood claims the novel is simply anti-religion when it becomes being a front for tyranny, people question whether she is anti-religion or not. Based on her choices throughout the novel, Atwood does not appear to be anti-religion. The overall attitude toward religion is that it is wrong when used to oppress people but not inherently…

In her novel The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood highlights women’s oppression and lack of freedom in Gilead as the female characters are forced to clothe themselves in specific gowns and unwillingly act as a submissive to the demands of their Commander. On the contrary, Thelma and Louise (1991) displays an epic journey of two women who have set off to escape the issues of their relationships, responsibilities, and problems at home and ultimately break away from the constraints of the world.…

Margaret Atwood's "The Handmaid's Tale" is a novel set in a dystopic future where women are used for reproductive purposes and are viewed as a tool. Similar to the society today, women are treated as second-class citizens who are controlled by men. Margaret Atwood demonstrates this throughout the novel by key incidents, narrative techniques and symbolism. Atwood's novel is set in a place called Gilead, which was once known as The United States of America. Gilead was formed due to a crisis of…