The Handmaid’s Tale

7 Pages 1771 Words

ficantly the Handmaids are named according to which ever commander they have been assigned. Therefore a woman ‘of’ the commander ‘Fred’ would become ‘Offred’. This process of naming women is a chief example of the way in which Gilead’s females are thought of as possessions.

The only two women, who do not view themselves as “a blank” (6), keep their original names. Some commander’s are “violating custom” in the use of “jezebels” (7), but these are not the only people who disobey the rules enforced in Gilead. Offglen, an old college friend introduces Offred to an underground movement who are opposed to the religious right wing extremists who have control of the state. Every regulation in Gilead is calculated to prevent this from happening. The division of women into their different roles helps to keep them in their respective places and forbids them from communicating. This is designed to eliminate the risk of group resistance but merely reduces it, as the underground movement proves. On the surface it appears to work, ‘Rita’, one of the ‘Marthas’, who is part of the commander’s household, shows no sympathy for Offred’s situation. Yet, she identifies with another Martha who has been accidentally shot. At a later point in the story we will also see Serena Joy, the commander’s wife, acting in a similar manner. Even the Handmaid’s, who are occasionally allowed out “in twos”, vie...