The Handmaid's Tale

, #1

by

Hardcover, 350 pages

English language

Published Jan. 1, 2006 by Everyman's Library.

ISBN:
978-0-307-26460-2
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OCLC Number:
140786839
Goodreads:
4025053

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5 stars (4 reviews)

A gripping vision of our society radically overturned by a theocratic revolution, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid's Tale has become one of the most powerful and most widely read novels of our time. Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead, serving in the household of the enigmatic Commander and his bitter wife. She may go out once a day to markets whose signs are now pictures because women are not allowed to read. She must pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, for in a time of declining birthrates her value lies in her fertility, and failure means exile to the dangerously polluted Colonies. Offred can remember a time when she lived with her husband and daughter and had a job, before she lost even her own name. Now she navigates the intimate secrets of those who control her every move, risking her life in breaking the rules. Like …

46 editions

reviewed La servante écarlate by Margaret Atwood (Pavillons)

Not so speculative fiction

5 stars

I was warned this book is not a fun one. Indeed it is not.

You get to see the omnipresent fear and violence of a patriarchal surveillance state. You get to see how it got there, little by little, and how it got accepted. The disturbing part is that it is very much believable...

I hadn't seen since Orwell's "1984" the effect of a totalitarian system on an individual so well described, especially at an individual level. You get to see how a single mind resists or breaks when faced with such overwhelming brutal and oppressive environment.

It is definitely worth reading, especially when you keep in mind the fact that Atwood has been censored in several US states.

reviewed The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (The Handmaid's Tale, #1)

Příběh ze světa, kde se přestaly rodit děti

4 stars

Stejnojmenný seriál mě zaujal, takže jsem si zákonitě musel přečíst i knihu. Ta odpovídá jen prvním dílům seriálu. Popisuje dystopický svět, kde se přestaly rodit děti a moc převzali muži, kteří z některých žen udělaly jen nádoby na plození dětí. Napsáno je to poutavě, čtivě a přitom člověku v hlavě naskakují různé otázky. Doporučuji.

reviewed Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood

a classic

5 stars

I read this classic just two years ago. It felt more relevant to the present than it may have been when it was written. This book is a revolutionary milestone in speculative fiction and probably feminist literature as well, but I found equally interesting that the text is based on progressive loss of innocence. The final chapter is incredible and left me very satisfied.

Subjects

  • Misogyny--Fiction.
  • Women--Fiction.