The Commander - Both Villain and Figure of Sympathy

To what extent is the Commander presented as both villain and a figure of sympathy?

The commander can be seen as a man torn between two worlds, he was one of the founders of Gilead yet still enjoys and yearns for the pleasures of the old society he managed to break. The commander is cool and collected on the surface but underneath he is bitter and corrupted for the world he has managed to create. The commander secretly longs for the world to be as it once was and this is why he savours his time with Offred because she may remind him of life before Gilead. It is also ironic how both characters feel under the surface an anger and repression of Gilead and they both want to break free. However on the surface when they play scrabble with each other they are calm and to a certain extent sophisticated, which shows a certain amount of sexual power.

Our first description of the Commander is on page 99. Here Atwood begins to dig more deeper into the complex and emotional themes that permeate the story. Here, Atwood opens up to us about the Commanders character and he is almost revealed to the reader and for Offred. The Quotation ‘he just looks like a museum guard’ show us that he’s just playing the part in the system. He is the main part in the play which can not go ahead without him. He is just doing his job. Here we almost have sympathy for him, as he is portrayed with a sense of insecurity and a loss in power. He doesn’t have a choice.

However then Atwood uses the word ‘semi-retired’, which suggest he is just killing time before death. We get the impression that we should not underestimate this man, there is more to him than meets the eye. This can be shown because Atwood has waited 100 pages to show us the character of the command...

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Women were becoming more powerful, and men felt challenged and forced for their place in the world. This shows the Commanders control, he wanted them to procreate further and give men back the power. The quotation ‘Better never means better for everyone, he says. It always means worse, for some. While it seems clear that the regime truly believes that drastic measures are necessary to ensure the survival of this population, it does not seem clear that the new rules are actually better for anyone. The only possible answer is that they are better for the Commanders, who, as Offred's Commander tells her, had lost all interest in sex because it was so easy to get. Even so, the Commander himself seems no happier, no more fulfilled or free in his sexual relations, than any man prior to the institution of the new regime. This suggests that the commander is