The Handmaid's Tale quotes

• "Things are back to normal. How can I call this normal"


  The new Ofglen is a reminder to Offred that she should continue to rebel/ she is beginning to become comfortable in Gilead/ she is mirroring Aunt Lydia's language.
• "She has died that I may live. I will mourn later"


  Just because Ofglen has died, Mayday does not die with her/ Atwood is celebrating the power of organised protest/ gives Offred a reason to survive and continue when her life becomes normal/ she will mourn later, inhabiting Ofglen's robotic and mechanical manner.
• "Hope is rising in me like sap in a tree. Blood in a wound. We have made an opening"


  - Ofglen acts as a symbol of organised protest, she inspires Offred to rebel, sap is organic/ beginning of growth/ organic is contrasted with the black van and how organised and mechanical Ofglen is / blood suggests that they are at risk, enhanced by the black van/ also suggests healing/ making an opening hints that they have found a weakness in Gilead/ they may have been wounded but will cut back.
• "She was lava beneath the crust of daily life"


  She is explosive/ could go off at any moment/ would destroy everything, including the handmaids, showing the power of selfish protest/ when Offred gets too comfortable with "daily life", Moira reminds her to rebel/ an emblem of hope.
• "Moira had power now, she'd been set loose, she'd set herself loose. She was now a loose woman."


  Moira is a genuine threat to Gilead/ she reclaims the power herself/ an emblem of hope/ reclaiming the term loose woman to empower her/ the idea of setting her "loose", suggests she is a danger and the handmaids know the power she has to change her situation/ shows the danger of unorganized rebellion.
• "his fingers encircling the ankle briefly, like a bracelet, where the tattoo is, a braille that he can read a cattle brand. It means ownership."


  The commander uses Offred to increase his sense of power as it is truly an illusion/ the tattoo confines her to her role/ similar to the red/ she cannot escape/ she is a resource/ it is another language that confines her there/ animalised/ It reminds her that she belongs to the commander/ boosts his ego.
• "their eyes look too big to me, too dark and shimmering, their mouths too red, too wet" / "antique and bizarre"


  Offred realises how conditioned she has become by society, to sexualise women/ repetition of "too", shows her negative feelings towards it as if it is shocking/ it is "antique" suggesting that the past was a long time ago but still cannot be fully removed/ the society is not as pure as it seems on the surface as it requires places for those in power to go back to their past desires/corruption of Gilead.
• "It's only the women who can't, who remain stubbornly closed, damaged, defective."


  There is an idea that men are invincible, cant be sterile/ allows men to deflect the blame onto women/ gives men someone to feel powerful over so they feel satisfied/ the idea of being stubborn in this society is looked down upon even though it is a tyranny.
• "If your dog dies get another."


  Everyone in Gilead in replaceable, women are animalised/ no respect for their individual lives.
• "My self is a thing I must now compose" / "I used to think my body was an instrument of pleasure"


  Offred detaches herself from herself, in order to preserve her sanity/ she must prepare it like a piece of music/ putting on her act/ objectifies herself as a "thing", to dethatch herself/ Her body used to be something she owned but now it is for societies' benefit.
• "I am a national resource"


  Women are objectified to fill a function/ hints to the importance of Handmaids in Gilead/ a potential weakness as it makes them invincible as they are needed by the nation.
• "We still had our bodies"


  In a society where women are objectified to their uteruses, they rebel by reclaiming the thing that traps them there/ "we" suggests female solidarity/ this is a weakness in Gilead.
• "sanity is a valuable possession; I hoard it the way people once hoarded money. I save it, so I will have enough, when the time comes"


  Sanity is her way of preserving herself for the fall of Gilead/ things that are not tangible are now most valuable/ it gives her hope for the end of Gilead.
• "The night is mine, my own time"


  Offred chooses to possess the night, rather than her room/ she possesses things that are not tangible and cannot be taken from her/ it allows her to think/ rebel.
• "with my idea of her courage, live it through, act it out, when I myself do not"


  Moira is an emblem of hope for the other handmaids/ gives them a reason to survive/ Offred lives through Moira/ glorifies her.
• "Lay is always passive, I lie then"


  Rebellion through language/ to maintain control/ she doesn't want to be passive to Gilead/ private protest/ not physically rebelling but rebelling mentally/ lie can mean a state of body but also to hide the truth like she is doing now through her private protest.
• "The door of the room - not my room, I refuse to say my - is not locked."


  Offred uses her language to rebel/ private protest/ later she begins to accept it as her own room as she becomes more submissive to Gilead.
• "thought must be rationed... thinking can hurt your chances and I intend to last"


  war like language/ sanity is a valuable possession/ Offred is a survivor rather than a hero/ she wants to "last", which suggests preservation and survival, so she can live again after Gilead/ shows hope for the end of Gilead.
• "Gilead is within you... There are no lawyers any more, and the university is closed"


  This is a warped phrase from the bible, "God is within you"/ suggests that Gilead it God/ trying to brainwash those within the regime/ there is a lack of knowledge, therefore lack of power common in SPP/ and a justice system/ unable to change their circumstances.
• "Broken symbolism from the time before"


  Gilead is a flawed community/ it is a palimpsest/ cannot fully erase the past/ windows of hope for the Handmaids/ symbolism suggests it has a deeper meaning/ Gilead uses a corrupt form of Christianity but the truth can't be forgotten.
• "I need to take it seriously, this desire of his. It could be important, it could be a passport, it could be my downfall"


  Although Offred has some power in this scene, by seeing the cracks in Gilead, she needs to recognize the power of the commander even if he does not use it/ for the commander Offred is just a "whim", she is being used by him/ it could work to her advantage / could also lead to her death.
• "He is demonstrating to me, his mastery of the world. He's breaking the rules"


  It is ironic that the commander has to break the rules of his own society/ he only has an illusion of power/ shows the corruption of Gilead and how it does not work for anyone/ also the commander needs Offred as a witness to his power to feel validated/ Offred's awareness of this gives her some control.
• "They pick him up and put him in the back of the van like a sack of mail."


  The eyes may not even be real/ but by creating fear they maintain control/ he is like mail/ a message to others not to break the rules.
• "Pretend not to see... But I cant help seeing."


  Shows the contrast between Offred and Ofglen/ Ofglen is mechanical/ is always working towards the bigger cause/ Offred gives into Gilead's control/ she is supposed to fear them.
• "It cruises slowly along the street, as if looking for something: shark on the prowl"


  The eyes don't have to rush they have a commanding power/ it is a flawless operation/ it is like a predator/ it could be anyone who is taken/ use of fear to control.
• "butter our skin to keep it soft, we can believe that we will some day get out... we have ceremonies of our own"


  Butter links to preservation as if they are meat/ gives them hope for a time after Gilead/ vanities of the past/ emblem of hope/ reclaiming of the word ceremony.
• "Doubled I walk the street"


  The Handmaids have a lack of identity/ are replaceable resources/ links to the strict surveillance of Gilead/ doubling as a method of control/ turns handmaids against each other/ lack of communication/ creates the look of an idealistic society from the outside.
• "She appears to have been an educated woman, insofar as a graduate of any North American College" "equally useless"


  Diminishing on the valuable evidence Offred supplied them in a tyranny/ He is more focused on the commander/ joking rather than looking at the seriousness of the time/ lack of growth.
• "Problems of Authentication in Reference to The Handmaid's Tale"


  The name of the lecture ignores the importance of the content/ neglects what should be learnt from Gilead/ rather looking for problems.
• "And so I step up, into the darkness within, or else the light"


  The final line is uncertain/ Atwood chooses to end with hope.