The Handmaid's Tale

In Margaret Atwood’s, The Handmaid’s Tale, a focal symbol is the color red.  Red typically represents sinfulness, sultriness/seductiveness, guilt, blood, and passion.  Sewn throughout the story, red symbolizes these specific traits, amongst others, through several incorporations.  Firstly, the Handmaids all wear the same, single red garment.  They are seen as inferior to the males in the society, along with the Wives, oddly their equals, of the men - with whom they have sex.  Their dress shows their supposed sinful nature, through their sexual interactions with married men (even though the hypocritical society approves of the actions).  Ironically, despite the usual connotation of passion with this act, they lack this crucial detail with the men, lending furthermore to the guilt they garner from their unfulfilling lives.  Lastly, their sole purpose is to reproduce, so red also suggests their fertility, through the application of blood and the menstrual cycle of women.  The color red plays a poignant role in The Handmaid’s Tale, representing many aspects of the Handmaids and the lives they lead.

“I go to the window and sit down on the window seat, which is too narrow for comfort.  There’s a hard little cushion on it, with a petit point cover:  FAITH, in square print, surrounded by a wreath of lilies.  FAITH is a faded blue, the leaves of the lilies a dingy green.  This is a cushion once used elsewhere, worn but not enough to throw out.  Somehow it’s been overlooked.”  (Atwood 57)
Offred notices this pillow with its ironic inscription while she looks out the window, of the house she occupies, down to the Commander.  This passage epitomizes the hypocrisy of Gilead.  Built upon the rock of faith and religion, it suppresses its society to conform to its rules and uses religious texts and customs completely out of context to defend its twisted modern beliefs, such as putting women beneath men and commanding them to submit to the men.  Women are forbidden to read, so the act of Offred reading the pillow in and of itself offers a bit of revolutionary hope.  Furthermore, as she looks over the Commander from above, both literally and figuratively, she later says how she wishes she could spit or throw something at him, like the pillow.  The Commander and the rest of the society live their lives in a sea of specious hypocrisy.  Offred sees this, and she realizes that the ruling created once for pure religious and political purposes has become the opposite of this.  By desiring to hit him with the pillow, she hopes to awaken the sleeping consciousness of the absurdity of their society in him.  The “faith” they once had built Gilead upon has faded away into oblivion.  The blues and greens of the beautiful past world are only a memory; faith, their supposed crutch in which their society was formed, is a false platform for their failing society.  It is nothing but a façade, a fake and faded fallacy.

As evidenced throughout the novel, Atwood’s primary focus is the mocking of radicals and their extreme views.  From feminism to religion, to sexuality to individualism, Atwood implores that these extremities held by some do not have adverse effects, like the ones she explores.  In ironic juxtaposition, the feminists and their rallies, such as burning of pornography, help lead to the later suppression of women, and radical religious views create a corrupt government once established for much more promising purposes.  I enjoyed these blatant contradictions and appreciate the satirical style which showed the author’s disapproval and fearfulness of tyrannical and extreme political and religious views.  The last portion of the novel is dedicated to “Historical Notes,” which reflect on Gilead in a future society.  The leaders analyzing and researching Gilead mock it, most likely because they do not understand it.  We fear and make fun of what we don’t understand.  The idea of Gilead seems so far-fetched.  However, the reality of radical views is obvious and their possible implications become more real.  Atwood accomplishes the instillation of fear through the suffering of the main character.  However, after 311 pages, we are left with no conclusion and an array of possible endings for the protagonist.  Did she escape the persecution of the oppressive domain?  And if so, was it luck or was she actually strong enough to achieve this on her own?  The novel commences and concludes (aside from the “Historical Notes”) with “Night” as the titles for the sections.  The night is unclear, dark, and foreboding – just like Gilead.  The Handmaid’s Tale finishes entirely with this single inquiry, “Are there any questions?” (311)  Oh, yes.  Plenty.  And that is undoubtedly the point, however frustrating that may be for the reader left in the dark of the night.