The Handmaid's Tale Response Piece

The wings are a “prescribed issue” to keep the Handmaids from “seeing, but also from being seen.”(8) The nun-like dresses desexualize women while ma... ... middle of paper ... ...t to advocating equality, both cultures enhance gender imbalance. This oppressive nature is worsened through the lack of sisterhood and cohesion among women in Gilead and feminist movements. The Handmaid’s Tale in essence supports feminist politics through demonstrating the wrongful exploitation of women. The book hereby satirizes feminism too. Aunt Lydia’s “freedom from” is in many ways a solution to feminist’s problems with “freedom to.”(24) The book highlights social injustice can take many approaches, visible or hidden, by criticizing repressive feminist ideologies.

According to Atwood in one of her many interviews, "women were intrinsically good and men bad; to divide along allegiance lines--that is, women who wore high heels and makeup were instantly suspect, those in overalls were acceptable"(Problems of). These ideas were and have been created by our social and political system and could not be fixed until such systems have been reformed. The feminist ideas that are expressed in this novel are necessary. Besides, these women do exist not only in the novel but women like this exist in real life. The women are treated as property instead of human beings.

She also implies that the feminist perspective, which she uses as no more than a title under which she can vent her own sexist attitude, is of crucial importance in reading James's Washington Square and Bell's perspectives. She believes that since she reads from the feminist perspective, she has more challenges and undertakings to recognize and deal with because of James's and Bell's use of phallic relations. One must not, however, take Rasmussen seriously. I felt that she was writing to please herself, and others like her who think that it is unjust, and sexist to write in a patriarchal manner. However, Washington Square was written in 1880 and was very much a patriarchal time.

Even though they go against gender stereotypes, complete equality is one battle avoided by Christine and Emilia. In Shakespeare’s Othello, Emilia defies gender norms when she employs a speculative mindset introduced by the character Christine in The Book of the City of Ladies. Christine realizes a new perspective on women’s oppression after her journey with the Ladies of Reason, Rectitude and Justice. In The Book of the City of Ladies, she becomes more outspoken about female priorities as the text progresses. “In short, all you women, whether high, middle or low social rank, should be especially alert and on your guard against those who seek to attack your honour and your virtue” (de Pizan 239).

Also during this time period feminist literature began to arise and was invaded by, “the complex social, ethical, and economic roots of sexual politics… as testimony to gender bias and the double standard” (“Sexual Politics and Feminist Literature”). In Jane Austen’s writing, readers have been aware of her constant themes of female independence and gender equality. However, many have criticized the author for the fact that many of her “individualistic” female characters have ended up married. However, “for pragmatic reasons, the author’s conclusions favor marriage as the ultimate solution, but her pairings predict happiness” (“Austen, Jane”). Als... ... middle of paper ... ...ied about his intentions during the entire novel, no one truly knows him.

This was especially so for women because the literary rhetoric of reform offered one means of negotiating domesticity's inherent contradiction that women were responsible for national morality but restricted from morality's larger public arenas." (Thompson 131) Social reform was started, and pushed along by women authors like these. They dared to write and publish their stories for the good of their people. Work Cited Mary K. DeShazer. The Longman Anthology of Women's Literature: from Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl.

Though the main point of Virginia Woolf’s “Professions for Women” is speaking to working women, it also provides insight into how the phantoms of society are created. In “Professions for Women,” Woolf tells of her own personal journey as a female writer and how breaking away from society’s expectations was difficult. The phantom of society was continually holding Woolf back, who began to call this being “The Angel in the House.” This “Angel in the House” was the image of society’s perfect woman, and it would whisper in Woolf’s ears what the public expected her to write. Woolf did not want to follow the angel’s instructions, so she killed the ghost. She puts it: “Had I not killed her she would have killed me.

Feminist Issues in The Handmaid's Tale The Handmaids Tale, by Margaret Atwood, can be classified as a distopic novel. The Republic of Gilead in The Handmaids Tale is characteristic of a distopia in that it is not intended as a prediction of the future of our society, but rather as a commentary on current social trends. Atwood has created this nation by isolating what she might consider the disturbing aspects of two diametrically opposed factions of our society (namely the religious right and radical feminism) as a theory as to what would happen if these ideals were taken to an extreme. Because she points out similarities in the thoughts and actions of the extreme religious right and certain parts of the feminist movement, some critics have labeled The Handmaid's Tale as anti-feminist. I would like to discuss the specific parts of the novel that lead to this opinion, and then discuss whether I believe this novel was intended as or can be seen as an attack on feminism.

Offred is a so-called handmaid, a class of women that are used by the state solely for the purpose of repopulation. Offred’s unique perspective and opinion regarding the regime is what makes the Handmaid’s tale a compelling book to read. Margaret Atwood uses various writing and literary techniques to inform the reader about the dangers of a totalitarian regime. Characterization is constantly used throughout the Handmaid’s tale in order to show the reader the horrors of Gilead. There are very few characters in the novel that are willing to stand up to the government.

All this bores down to nature of institution, their patriarchal marriage, which marginalizes women unto the boundaries of equality. Nevertheless, the feminist writer used her story to avert the stereotypes of wives being treated as sex mates. Stated differently, Chinelo was advocating for marriage liberalization through