the handmaid's tale Flashcards
What is theonomy?
a government founded in religious beliefs
What is totalitarianism?
a complete dictatorship
What is fundamentalism?
strict extremism
What is puritanism?
A group of people whose lives are central to the church
What is the Lebensborn?
an SS initated association in Nazi Germany that aimed to increase birth rate of Aryan (racially pure) children
How is misogyny presented in Gilead?
- it has a status system defining standards
-domestic politics
-prevented women from being flexible around men’s desires
What did critic Amin Malak say about Gilead?
The state in Gilead prescribes a pattern of life based on frugality, conformity, censorship, corruption, fear, life and terror…
What did critic Ehreinreich say about patriarchy?
Gilead is a fortress of patriarchy.
What did critic Givner say about lack of identity?
‘Just as the rulers of Gilead try to eliminate mirrors, the reflections of faces, so they attempt to erase names.’
What did critic Linda Martin say about the gileadean society?
“The novel is a prediction of the horrors of cultures frightened by normal sexuality and prescribed to procreation, It is a brutal horrifying culture.”
What did critic Reshmi say about choice?
‘Atwood suggests that the society of today where there are too many choices may lead to a totalitarian future that prohibits choice.”
What did critic Ehreinreich say about choice of narrator?
‘Atwood’s choice of narrator turns the traditionally masculine dystopian genre upsiude down’
What does the Bible passage symbolise/mean?
Women’s desires for a child as it is what makes them relevant in Gilead. The Handmaid’s fertility is utilised to the Wives’ advantage
Margaret Attwood quotes
‘the charcater of the story was brought up in our time, our language’
‘the novel is a vehicle for looking at society’
Control and resistance theme
