0:00:06.880,0:00:11.070 In Margaret Atwood's near-future novel,[br]"The Handmaid's Tale," 0:00:11.070,0:00:15.089 a Christian fundamentalist regime[br]called the Republic of Gilead 0:00:15.089,0:00:19.491 has staged a military coup[br]and established a theocratic government 0:00:19.491,0:00:21.513 in the United States. 0:00:21.513,0:00:24.241 The regime theoretically [br]restricts everyone, 0:00:24.241,0:00:30.123 but in practice a few men have structured[br]Gilead so they have all the power, 0:00:30.123,0:00:33.331 especially over women. 0:00:33.331,0:00:37.711 The Handmaid's Tale is what Atwood calls[br]speculative fiction, 0:00:37.711,0:00:40.712 meaning it theorizes [br]about possible futures. 0:00:40.712,0:00:42.582 This is a fundamental characteristic 0:00:42.582,0:00:46.181 shared by both utopian [br]and dystopian texts. 0:00:46.181,0:00:50.863 The possible futures in Atwood's novels[br]are usually negative, or dystopian, 0:00:50.863,0:00:57.413 where the actions of a small group[br]have destroyed society as we know it. 0:00:57.413,0:01:02.273 Utopian and dystopian writing[br]tends to parallel political trends. 0:01:02.273,0:01:05.624 Utopian writing frequently depicts[br]an idealized society 0:01:05.624,0:01:09.525 that the author puts forth as a blueprint[br]to strive toward. 0:01:09.525,0:01:11.325 Dystopias, on the other hand, 0:01:11.325,0:01:14.723 are not necessarily predictions [br]of apocalyptic futures, 0:01:14.723,0:01:18.604 but rather warnings about the ways[br]in which societies can set themselves 0:01:18.604,0:01:21.902 on the path to destruction. 0:01:21.902,0:01:26.335 The Handmaid's Tale was published in 1985,[br]when many conservative groups 0:01:26.335,0:01:30.255 attacked the gains made [br]by the second-wave feminist movement. 0:01:30.255,0:01:34.375 This movement had been advocating greater[br]social and legal equality for women 0:01:34.375,0:01:37.615 since the early 1960s. 0:01:37.615,0:01:40.605 The Handmaid's Tale imagines a future[br]in which the conservative 0:01:40.605,0:01:43.586 counter-movement gains [br]the upper hand 0:01:43.586,0:01:47.376 and not only demolishes the progress[br]women had made toward equality, 0:01:47.376,0:01:51.805 but makes women completely [br]subservient to men. 0:01:51.805,0:01:55.576 Gilead divides women in the regime[br]into distinct social classes 0:01:55.576,0:01:59.072 based upon their function[br]as status symbols for men. 0:01:59.072,0:02:01.476 Even their clothing is color-coded. 0:02:01.476,0:02:03.211 Women are no longer allowed to read 0:02:03.211,0:02:05.581 or move about freely in public, 0:02:05.581,0:02:08.757 and fertile women are subject[br]to state-engineered rape 0:02:08.757,0:02:13.697 in order to give birth to children[br]for the regime. 0:02:13.697,0:02:16.086 Although The Handmaid's Tale[br]is set in the future, 0:02:16.086,0:02:19.197 one of Atwood's self-imposed[br]rules in writing it 0:02:19.197,0:02:21.506 was that she wouldn't use any event[br] 0:02:21.506,0:02:25.387 or practice that hadn't already [br]happened in human history. 0:02:25.387,0:02:28.357 The book is set [br]in Cambridge, Massachusetts, 0:02:28.357,0:02:30.987 a city that during [br]the American colonial period 0:02:30.987,0:02:34.633 had been ruled by the theocratic Puritans. 0:02:34.633,0:02:37.702 In many ways, the Republic of Gilead[br]resembles the strict rules 0:02:37.702,0:02:40.407 that were present in Puritan society: 0:02:40.407,0:02:41.667 rigid moral codes, 0:02:41.667,0:02:43.159 modest clothing, 0:02:43.159,0:02:45.039 banishment of dissenters, 0:02:45.039,0:02:50.349 and regulation of every aspect [br]of people's lives and relationships. 0:02:50.349,0:02:53.709 For Atwood, the parallels [br]to Massachusett's Puritans 0:02:53.709,0:02:56.399 were personal as well as theoretical. 0:02:56.399,0:02:59.348 She spent several years studying[br]the Puritans at Harvard 0:02:59.348,0:03:01.919 and she's possibly descended from[br]Mary Webster, 0:03:01.919,0:03:07.549 a Puritan woman accused[br]of witchcraft who survived her hanging. 0:03:07.549,0:03:10.180 Atwood is a master storyteller. 0:03:10.180,0:03:13.639 The details of Gilead, [br]which we've only skimmed the surface of, 0:03:13.639,0:03:17.549 slowly come into focus through the eyes[br]of its characters, 0:03:17.549,0:03:20.402 mainly the novel's protagonist Offred, 0:03:20.402,0:03:23.689 a handmaid in the household [br]of a commander. 0:03:23.689,0:03:25.740 Before the coup that established Gilead, 0:03:25.740,0:03:31.900 Offred had a husband, a child, a job,[br]and a normal, middle-class American life. 0:03:31.900,0:03:34.580 But when the fundamentalist regime[br]comes into power, 0:03:34.580,0:03:37.210 Offred is denied her identity, 0:03:37.210,0:03:38.500 separated from her family, 0:03:38.500,0:03:41.202 and reduced to being, in Offred's words, 0:03:41.202,0:03:46.231 "a two-legged womb for increasing [br]Gilead's waning population." 0:03:46.231,0:03:49.271 She initially accepts the loss [br]of her fundamental human rights 0:03:49.271,0:03:52.871 in the name of stabilizing [br]the new government. 0:03:52.871,0:03:57.276 But state control soon extends[br]into attempts to control the language, 0:03:57.276,0:03:58.142 behavior, 0:03:58.142,0:04:01.642 and thoughts of herself[br]and other individuals. 0:04:01.642,0:04:03.631 Early on, Offred says, 0:04:03.631,0:04:07.202 "I wait. I compose myself. 0:04:07.202,0:04:13.413 My self is a thing I must compose, [br]as one composes a speech." 0:04:13.413,0:04:17.362 She likens language [br]to the formulation of identity. 0:04:17.362,0:04:21.652 Her words also acknowledge [br]the possibility of resistance, 0:04:21.652,0:04:26.363 and it's resistance, the actions of people[br]who dare to break the political, 0:04:26.363,0:04:27.315 intellectual, 0:04:27.315,0:04:28.625 and sexual rules, 0:04:28.625,0:04:32.273 that drives the plot [br]of the Handmaid's Tale. 0:04:32.273,0:04:37.403 Ultimately, the novel's exploration[br]of the consequences of complacency, 0:04:37.403,0:04:40.422 and how power can be wielded unfairly, 0:04:40.422,0:04:45.383 makes Atwood's chilling vision[br]of a dystopian regime ever relevant.