I. NIGHT- Chapter 1

Chapter 1: The setting is outlined and the traces of old life are described. The struggles of their life are highlighted and their horrible treatment is outlined. Five names are mentioned to set us up for this story.

• ‘We slept in what had once been the gymnasium

• ‘We’ is a collective pronoun, the novel opens with a collective pronoun suggesting the homogeneity across all Handmaids

• ‘Gymnasium’- imagery, as if they are being re-educated, you also take refugees to huge places like gymnasiums, to evacuate people when disasters happen

  ‘A palimpsest of unheard sound’

• ‘Palimpsest’- (archaic word) a piece of writing material on which later writing has been superimposed on earlier writings; something reused or altered but still bearing visible traces of its earlier

• Metaphor- physical state of the US is still there, traces of US remain, previous belief still there

  ‘Like children’s and army issue blankets , old ones that still said U.S’

• ‘Children’s’- the uniform beds are a sign of infantilisation, dehumanisation

• ‘Still said U.S’- secondary material, new regime→ Gilead, but traces of previous life

• Sleeping inmates lie under fuzzy flannelette and military blankets, a blend of images suggesting the dystopian fusion of gentleness with militarism.

  ‘The lights were turned down but not out’

• Infantilisation- constant surveillance

• Not down enough to be fully alone

  ‘The Angels stood outside it with their backs to us’

• Imagery- Angels are divine, heavenly protectors

• Roles of Angels have been subverted

  ‘We learned to lip-read’

• Infantilisation, suggests the strong level of oppression

• You don’t learnt this as an adult

  ‘Alma. Janine. Dolores. Moira. June’

• Listing- foreshadowing the telling of their stories

• Their names- own individual sentences symbolising their identities and importance

• THEIR STORY

• ‘The illusion of protection, symbolized by barbed wire atop the chain-link fence, leaves the unsettling question of the inmates' status: are they being nurtured or imprisoned? Their names imply an answer — Alma, which is Latin for nurturing, or kindly; Delores, which comes from the Latin word for grief, and June, reflecting the Roman Juno, goddess of marriage and the family. Likewise, Janine and Moira are romantic versions of John and Mary, two names so enduring that they conjure images of stability and normalcy. Likewise, the aunts, Sara and Elizabeth, bear Old Testament names reflecting motherhood — Sarah, Hebrew for princess, the elderly woman who became the mother of the Hebrew nation; and Elizabeth, the aged parent of John the Baptist, forerunner of Christ’