Studied by 9 people
These were quotes I memorised for my MATSEC A level Exams for June 2021
"I am her spy as she is mine"
This quote illustrates that friendship cannot be formed but rather women are made to be suspicious of each other as ordered by the regime
"dried flower petals"
Offred's comparison to love as it is outlawed
"the time before"
pre-Gilead
"acting rather than a real act"
This quote illustrates how Gilead's constrains real action and forces its subjects into roles to be played
"business transaction"
Highlights how the economic system is based on female bodies with reproductive organs for rent.
"Nobody dies from lack of sex. It's lack of love we die from"
This quote gives the reader the impression that Offred longs for intimacy in a relationship.
"look at the stats, my dear. Was it really worth it, falling in love?"
This rhetorical questions said by the Commander allows the reader to simultaneously wonder
"silly" and "juvenile"
Offred's description of the Commander
"she[Ofglen] is my[Offred] spy as I am hers"
Offred is given another handmaid to go out with - to have control over their routine
"This is not my room"
Offred doesn't accept her living quarters as hers
"my name isn't Offred"
rejects the identity imposed onto her
"The fact is that I no longer want to leave, escape, cross the border to freedom"
Through her secret affair with Nick, she finds hope
"Blessed are the merciful. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are the silent. I knew they made that up"
Beatitudes recited at the centre show how the government edited biblical passages to suit their views and to brainwash the handmaids in being a certain way
'Milk and Honey', 'Loaves and Fishes', 'All Flesh'
Handmaids are not allowed to read and the names of shops have been replaced by pictorial images taken from the bible
'Blessed be thy fruit', 'May the Lord open'
Language used between handmaids is prescribed and based on religion.
also refer to the handmaids' fruitfulness / child-bearing qualities.
'Salvaging'
The term refers to the 'saving' of Gilead from potential threats posed by offenders of the regime
"I don't want to be telling this story"
it is clear that Offred does not want to be a part of this - she disassociates herself from the situation
"hatred fills my mouth like spit"
Offred's feelings towards Aunt Lydia and the particicution
"They're watching"
emphasises the idea of surveillance and the fact that handmaids are always being watched
"I am, I am. I am, still"
Displays Offred's determination to survive
"I will do anything you like"
Offred articulates that she wants to survive
'all of this is a reconstruction' + 'I made that up'
Offred is an unreliable narrator
'I would like to believe this is a story I'm telling'
Offred tells her story as a means to survive
'control over the ending'
Offred sees her story as a construct and she believes that the same event can be viewed from different perspectives
'teasing a dog with a bone'
Offred notices her passivity when teasing the guards
"I added that in later"
Offred has control and she is aware of her narrative
"Give me children or else I die"
this is Offred's mantra and describes her precarious situation
"I am not sure how it happened; not exactly"
Post modernism element - Offred questions the boundaries between fiction and reality. The readers are forced to assemble and construct her story.
"By telling you anything at all, I'm at least believing ... you into being"
Offred invents her listeners
"two-legged wombs"
The handmaids have a loss of Identity with a focus on the functionality of their body and their fertility.
"There are only women who are fruitful and women who are barren"
Aunt Lydia's teaching
"Freedom to and freedom from"
Aunt Lydia romantisises the present and future situation over the past.
"She wanted our heads bowed just right"
Aunt Lydia instills a level of indoctrination.
"make words with them that don't exist ... giggling over them"
Only under the Commander can Offred become more like a free-thinking woman of her past.
"Gilead is within you"
Aunt Lydia's words are a play on Christs as a means of indoctrination
"arranged in no particular order"
supported by 'The Historical Notes', which provides the reader with the idea that all that they have just read is a series of tapes, unnumbered
"Names... connection"
Pieixoto's choice of diction diminishes the horrors which the handmaids went through as the relationships they had with their "owners" was not one by such a connection but a forced imprisonment for sexual purposes.
"establishing an identity"
Although both Pieixoto and Wade see their task as such for Offred, they fail to respond to the identity she established for herself through her narrative.
"can't remember exactly"
due to her inability of "writing it down" thus the reader is made to feel uncomfortable over which is fact or false
"tail" vs "tale"
Pieixoto's view of Offred is only as a sex object as he makes numerous sexist jokes such as referring women as "The Underground Frailroad", suggesting his view of women being weak.
"nuclear-plant accidents ... disposal sites"
Atwood's strong awareness of environmental issues present themselves in this novel as harsh governmental regulations only appeared due to a decrease in fertility and an increase in genetic deformities caused by toxic pollution
"secret pre-Gilead gene-splicing experiments with mumps"
Pieixoto states that it was due to that that the Commanders ended up coming into contact with a "sterility-causing virus"
"Are there any questions?"
Atwood provides the readers with an additional mystery where the last sentence within the novel
"God is a National Resource"
Gilead makes use of such whitewashing political trickery though pious language and emphasises the authority the Bible has on the founders of Gilead predominating the slogan
"Blessed are the meek"
to have oppressive control over handmaids, unwomen and other roles low in the hierarchy.
"there was little that was truly original" [about Gilead]
clarifies the ironic reasons why women were selected to become a Handmaid, as the story of Rachel and Leah is about a bigamous marriage and yet Handmaids are pulled from 'adulterous' relationships.
"Prayvaganzas"," Salvagings" and "Particicutions"
Gilead distorts their rituals by specially created terms serving as Atwood's warning over the dangers of a totalitarian society and its connection between the state's ability to repress its citizens and its perversion of language.
"see the world in gaps" through "white wings"
handmaid's were forced to focus on the images around them
"Loaves and Fishes, All Flesh, Milk and Honey"
symbols for all the stores which incorporate religious terminology and biblical references
"striped dresses, red and blue and green and cheap and skimpy"
Econowives's outfit - which although are still the prescribed colours, indicate their need to fulfil the higher female roles.
"too tired to go on with this story"
Offred hints at her power of choosing what to tell her readers
"Here is a different story, a better one. This is the story of what happened to Moira"
Offred's tricky narrative technique hints this may not be a written account as she addresses the reader directly - this adds a sense of unreliability
"thirty-three years old... brown hair... five seven without shoes"
offred's description
"into the darkness within or else the light
Offred's final fate remaining a mystery - the reader is baffled further with Piexoto and left with questions, giving the story an open-ending.
"Unwomen", "Children of Ham" and "Sons of Jacob"
enemies of the state are given biblical names in order to set them apart from the rest of society
"a cloud, congealed around a central object,"
Gilead's attitude towards women to be objects important only for their "national resource", the womb from which they bear children and suggesting the idea of detachment of mind and body
"Modesty is invisibility", "You are spoiled girls" and "Now you are being given freedom from. Don't underrate it"
Aunt Lydia's distorted and misogynistic words presented Offred's thoughts when presented with certain situations.
"don't want to look at something that determines" them "so completely"
handmaids being uncomfortable with their own nakedness
"the bible is kept locked up"
the government benefits by not having any opposition from a silent society
another way... another man"
Serena Joy asserts dominance over Offred by offering her that in order to appear sympathetic towards her, when in reality, she is doing this to get an infant of her own
"a light blue veil"
irony - contrasting symbols of fertility and virginity display how Serena must be present during the ceremony yet never engages in intercourse herself.
a "Butch paradise"
Moira tried to minimize the severity of the situation of Jezebel's
"one of Aunt Lydia's pets" + "whiny bitch" + "sucky"
Janine clearly displays her fragile nature by first being a victim to her story of her own rape in pre-Gileadean society and then by becoming such
"glowing, rosy" with "a trace of a smirk" VS "very thin, skinny almost" figure with "no smile of triumph this time."
Parallelism is present through her appearance and mental state as when she was pregnant; However, once information spreads that her baby "was a shredder after all", the depletion of her mental state appears on her exterior.
"our job is not to censure but to understand."
The idea that they should judge Gilead for their actions suggest that Prof. Piexoto has a degree of sympathy for the cause.
Note 
Flashcard (45)