The Handmaid's Tale

The Handmaid's Tale

Being human to me means living your life the way you want it, by going to school or getting the dream job, and home that you want to live in the rest of your life, so that you are the happiest you can be with your life. This is not how things were in The Handmaid's Tale where women and men were categorized by their duties in the Republic of Gilead, and not given a choice of how they wanted to live their life.

Freedom is respected throughout the world, but in some areas freedom is limited more than in other areas. Some countries such as in the Middle East, women are limited to what they can do and how they are supposed to dress, which is very similar to the Handmaids who must have had their faces covered from everyone outside of the house. In the book, I felt that each group of people (Marthas, Handmaids, Wives, Guardians etc.) were all trapped in a world that they were forced into without having a choice. The only way that they could get out of the republic was to go to the colonies which were full of famine and disease. This knowledge, I believe, kept the women in their roles of Handmaids or Marthas for example, because even though they did not have much freedom having a job, a place to live, and food to eat each day was better than trying to survive in the colonies where they were trying to survive on very little with many diseases.

When Offred asks the Commander if Jezebel's is a legal place, he explains to her, "But everyone's human after all" (237). I believe that the Commander was trying to tell Offred that every person needs to have time to let go and do what they want to do because of the strict regulations that every person had to follow in the republic. Going to Jezebel's and having Offred play scrabble with him during late nights, gave the Commander freedom and a since of being human rather than the tough Commander that he was supposed to be. By giving Offred lotion, letting her look at magazines, and play scrabble when she was not even supposed to read at all, the Commander was giving Offred freedom like she had had before she became a handmaid and was able to live her life as an actual human being. The Commander, I believe, treats Offred this way so that she relaxes when she is with him and feels like a human who is free.

When the guardian is being beaten by the Handmaids, Offred sees him as an "it" because he was being accused of rape, and she did not want to see him as an actual person while beating him. Offred goes along with the beating of the man so as not to be seen by the "Eyes" as a person who is trying to fight the republic, and by seeing the man as an "it" and not a human may have been easier for her to attack him for her own safety against the republic.

When the Commanders wife starts to figure out that Offred is seeing her husband at night, Offred fears for