Offred

• Real name is never learnt - patronymic Offred

• Both the protagonist and the Narrator

• Most realised character

• Reader has sympathy for Offred but is let down by her marginalisation

• Previous life was characterised by

  • motherhood

  • friendship

  • marriage

  • and work

• She was never political (unlike her mother who was a raging feminist) and did not foresee what was going to happen to the USA

• her only means of survival is through small rebellions.

• She has an ironic and cynical sense of humour

• She also has a strong sense of holding onto the past - she never psychologically becomes a handmaid.

• she tends to separate the body from the mind to prevent mental collapse/to cope

• She uses word games to remain intellectually healthy.

• she is an asutute observer and describes the things around her in a satirical yet precise way.

• she is a self conscious narrator- she reminds the reader of her flaws in her storytelling. Hers is a very subjective narrative. she has to recount unpleasant experiences to communicate the full truth of her story.

• she does retain a sense of privacy - we never discover her daughters real name/her real name or what happened the first night with nick

• she is both independent and feminine - middle ground between extremes of feminism.

• she is both educated and intelligent - recognises and highlights the ironies and contradictions of the time before gilead.

• she has limited choices but takes responsibility for her actions

• she tends to resist the regime passively and internally opposed to kicking against it like moira or joining the resistance like Ofglen

• pitched midway between moira, the radical rebel and jeanine the obedient tell tale.

• offred admits to forgetting what she even looks like

• in the midst of this conversion there are things she holds onto and desires, luke, her daughter, a cigarette, her mother’s overalls and outburst to inequality.

• The name Offred

  • Of fred - patronymic

  • Afraid - obviously she tends to be more cautious than moira

  • Off red - rebelling against the colour red and the symbol of fertility

  • Offered - she is obviously offered and sacrificed for the good of the state

  • Off read - misread - unreliable narrator

• this variety of her name reminds us that there is far more to offred than the state wishes there to be

• offred effort to navigate her new identity

• offred does engage in defiance: saves butter in shoes so she has something for herself, makes eye contact with guard, sleeping with nick.

Offred quotes

“my name isn’t Offred, I have another name, which nobody uses now because it’s forbidden.”

“I have failed once again to fulfill the expectations of others, which have become my own”

“I used to think of my body has an instrument, a pleasure, or a means of transportation, or an implement for the accomplishment of my will. Now I am a cloud, congealed around a central object, the shape of a pear, which is hard and more real than I am and glows red within its translucent wrapping.”

“we were the people who were not in the papers. we lived in the blank white spaces at the edge of print. it gave us more freedom. we lived in tha gaps between the stories” offred admits to being ignorant with the political issues going on pre-gilead. it was just easier and safer.

“we lived, as usual, by ignoring. ignoring isn’t the same as ignorance. you have to work at it.”

“I wait. I compose myself. myself is a thing i must now compose as one composes a speech. what i must present is a made thing, not something born.”

the narrator almost seems like she is being split into two parts: within this new handmaid, the narrator works to present a version of herself that is a thing she composes. she cant behave naturally or impulsively; she has to constantly play a role.

The Commander

• the is the agent of her oppression - both directly as her commander and indirectly through his role in the constructing of the oppressive regime

• he description of the commander is constantly changing as Offred’s feelings for him change.

• he is quite an elusive character despite the fact that he is offred’s strongest relationship.

• Ruthless, imposing, well educated, clever.

• among the elite who are responsible for the implantation of the gileadean regime.

• he is blind to the effects of the regime he helped to introduce.

• he genuinely belives it is a good thing.

• he shows no remorse over the death of the previous offred

• he is too lonely and isolated in his own regime and has to break some of the rules he introduced.

• becomes more and more unlikeable as the novel progresses

• paternal and patronising to offred

• his behaviour at Jezebels reveals his ignorance and deeply sexist opinions. - “nature demands variety”

• he gives the regime a human face, he seems to be the average man.

• most complex and ambiguous character - both politically and personally. He represents the worst of the gileadean regime.

• Offred compares her situation with the one of the woman who was the mistress of a Nazi death camp guard. The woman insisted that her lover was not the monster. Offred slowly starts to enjoy the commanders company when they first start spending more time together. he is not a monster, to her. Offred suggest that it is easy when you know a monster on a personal level, it creates a humanity for them.

• Both offred and the reader recognise that the commander is a prisoner in the prison he himself constructed; and if his pain was bad the one for women was way worse.

• As the novel progresses, the reader comes to realise that his visits with offred are selfish rather than charitable as they satisfy his need for companionship and that he doesn’t seem to care that they put offred in terrible risk.

• gentle reminders throught the novel that he is offred’s top oppressor, such as the time they visited Jezebel’s and he reminded her that the number tattoo on her ankle “means ownership”

• he represents a dichotomy

  • Offred enjoys the rush of excitement felt by her rebellion

  • But she is constrained by this so-called freedom- any wrong move on her end could result in brutal murder.

  • But she is in no position to deny any of his requests as he has way more power over her.

the commander is a symbol of Offred’s oppression on two levels:

level one:

His power over her as a high-up man in a totalitarian regime - he not only justifies but supports and upholds the system. The government he is sustaining is a threat to the lives of all women, as well as all men with the exception of the few lucky enough to ignore its strict rules and do as they please (like the commander). H e downplays the horrific reality of the regime stating that “you can’t make an omlette without breaking eggs.” - he believes this is for the greater good that is gilead to exist.

level two:

His power over her specifically as her commander - He has the power to ruin Offred’s life whenever he pleases. he owns her and she is powerless. she endures a repulsive sexual encounter with him despite her obvious distaste “move your flesh around, breathe audibly. It’s the least you can do.”.

Commander quotes.

“he is showing me off, to them… but also showing off to me. he is demonstrating, to me, his mastery of the world. he is breaking the rules, under their noses, thumbing his nose at them, getting away with it.”

“for him, I must remember, I am only a whim.”

“if your dog dies, ger another.” - emphasises the sheer ruthless attitude to women that the society of gilead possess"

“you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs”

“he was not a monster, to her”

Serena Joy

• most important female character in Offred’s daily life.

• she once was a presenter for a religious television programme plugging conservative and anti-feminist values; publically drumming up support for the very patriarchal system that now oppresses her.

• Representation of the spurned wife.

• She is desperate to have children but unable to, so she suffers the procreation arrangements.

• Indulges her motherly insticts by nurturing her plants in her garden and knitting.

• She is trapped in her own ideals.

• Frustration and unhappiness are very evident in her chain smoking and surly manner.

• jealousy

• gossiping

• cold

• vindictive

• believes in love - her love for her husband verges on possessiveness - unlike her husband who believes that men need variety.

• she is both wretched and generous to offred

• mixed feelings when offred leaves

• she does arouse the reader’s sympathy

• this situation makes the relationship between offred and serena joy strained, as they both need each other for survival but they do resent this need.

• she is also a victim , but has more privilege and power than the rest of the women.

quotes

“which of us is it worse for, her or me?”

“i am a reproach to her, a necessity”

moira

• symbolises rebellion and freedom in an authoritarian society governed by violent misogynists

• A very strong character with a strong sense of survival which pervades her actions

• possibly the most influential character on offred, her beacon of hope.

• unconventional, self assured, funny, and individual.

• he sexuality, speech, and mannerism are stereotypically masculine - in a state such as gilead - is in itself a form of rebellion.

• her humour at the red centre is important to the other handmaids as it is the only weapon they have against the tyranny of the aunts. But she seems to not be able to take things seriously as she jokes about everything and laughs off danger.

• politically feminist and a lesbian. Very conscious of her rights.

• betrays herself and her ideals at Jezebel's. In a way also betraying Offred.

• Despite the several attempts to escape, she is captured and condemned to a factious life within the regime.

quotes

“she is now a loose woman” - Moira’s escape, being freed from the clutches of this totalitarian regime.

“like an elevator with open sides” - dangerous, carefree, freedom of movement

“she was lava beneath the crust of daily life”

“she is frightening me now, because what I hear in her voice is indifference, a lack of volition” - here moira is presented as a completely different woman, one who has fallen victim to this patriarchal society. this state of defeat juxtaposes the rebellious moira we have been reading about throughout the entirety of the novel. even the regime’s strongest fighters reach their limits - proves how the regime can break down a person until theres nothing left.

Nick

• The Commander’s chauffeur

• attractive and sexy with an air of mystery. his motives and desires are never revealed throughout the novel.

• He acts as Offred’s rescue from the restricted and humiliating world of gilead.

• He symbolises love, and most importantly, the reality for which offred longs for.

• He eschews social norms by making eye-contact and speaking informally with women.

• he is an enigmatic character - conspires with serena joy to get offred pregnant, but also goes behind her back to have an illicit affair with offred.

• offred has early suspicions that he is an Eye but there are later on suggestions that he is a member of MayDay

Ofglen

• altruistic heroine - works tirelessly for the resistance movement.

• represents collective resistance in opposition to Moira’s lone rebellion

• Where offred struggles with cowardice, Ofglen is decisive and courages.

• Reacts very differently to offred when the black van is coming for her (she hangs herself)

• First given an unkind description. Offred wasn’t sure if she was one who truly believed in the system or not. she compares her walking to a “trained pig”

Ofwarren/Janine

• Janine is truly the victim of this regime

• Willingly does the biddings of the aunts and is unable to resist the terrible pressure to conform to the norms and values of the Gileadean theocracy.

• She appears to have achieved every handmaid’s goal by getting pregnant, however, the baby girl, is deemed to be an unbaby.

• she is a devout believer in the system but is destroyed by its practices - she goes mad.

• Ofwarren extremely violent behaviour during the particiution suggests that she has completely lost the grip on sanity (she grabs a clumb of his hair and giggles)

The aunts - Aunt Lydia

• the aunts are older women who train handmaids, deliver babies and preside over salvagings.

• They betray their gender by collaborating with the new regime.

• They use physical punishments as means of control

• their title is deceiving; the title aunt suggest that they are caring and supportive figures the handmaids can trust.

• Aunt Lydia is a senior matron at the Red Centre.

• she indoctrinates the trainee handmaids with her clichéd, simplistic, conservative dogma, and also authorises the handmaids in taking part in the particiution.

• She specialises in doing hte dirty work of the regime in order to curry favour and retain authority in a worls were being an old, infertile single woman offers very limited opportunities,

• According to Moira, she is a sadist masquerading as a faithful and pious servant of the state - “She enjoyed that, you know, She pretended to do all that love-the-sinner, hate-the-sin stuff, but she enjoyed it”