The Handmaids Tale

Key Facts
Full title The Handmaids Tale Author Margaret Atwood Type of work Novel Genre Anti-utopian (or dystopian) novel; science fiction; feminist political novel Language English Time and place written Early 1980s, West Berlin and Alabama Date of first publication 1986

Narrator Offred, a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead Point of view Offreds. She tells the story in the immediate present tense but frequently shifts to past tense for flashbacks to life before Gilead and to her time in the Red Center. Much of her narration is concerned not with events or action, but with her emotional state, which is often affected by the memories that well up from her happier past. Tone The novels tone is dark, and at times elegiac for the lost world before Gilead. Consistently unhappy, Offred finds both refuge and pain in her memories. A sense of fear and paranoia also pervades the novel, since all the characters live under a ruthless, totalitarian government. Tense Offred describes her life in the Commanders home in the present tense but frequently shifts to the past tense to describe flashbacks and memories.

setting (time) The not-too-distant future setting (place) Cambridge, Massachusetts protagonist Offred major conflict The Republic of Gilead has subjugated women and reduced Handmaids like Offred to sexual slavery. Offred desires happiness and freedom, and finds herself struggling against the totalitarian restrictions of her society.