The Handmaid’s Tale: Fact or Fiction?

The Handmaid’s Tale, written by Margaret Atwood and published in 1985, is a dystopian novel that throws the reader into the formation of an oppressive regime called Gilead. Atwood depicts a world where a woman’s value is solely based on their ability or inability to bear children, leaving the men virtually untouched. The Earth was suffering from massive amounts of pollution, leading to declining fertility rates. Change had to come in the form of Gilead. There are Handmaids, Marthas, Unwomen, and Wives. The novel follows Handmaid Offred, who is forced to have the children of an extremely powerful Commander, all while facing multitudes of abuse. It would be comforting to say that Gilead and its oppression of women was purely a figment of Atwood’s imagination, and that the real world could never mirror such cruelty. However, there’s more to the story. 

In an article written by Atwood herself on LitHub, she talks about her thoughts while writing the novel.

“I made a rule for myself: I would not include anything that human beings had not already done in some other place or time, or for which technology did not already exist.” 

The Handmaid’s Tale is speculative fiction. Atwood drew inspiration from political and historical events to paint the picture of Gilead for her readers. She did not invent the heinous punishments and laws of that dystopia. In an interview with the Penguin Publishing Group, Atwood mentioned how she utilized newspaper clippings to find content for her novel since she did not have internet access at the time. Her book is not as fictional as one may initially think. 

Atwood took inspiration from totalitarian states, the Bible, the slave trade, the Salem Witch Trials, and more. She wove together bits and pieces of Western history in combination with creative license, resulting in a book that speaks to its audience decades after its release. 

Atwood’s reliance on historical and political occurrences is one of the reasons why the novel continues to hit home with some of its readers. Especially in today’s society, where it almost seems as though we are going backward in time. 

Roe v. Wade was overturned in 2022. Josh Schriver, a Michigan State Representative, wants to overturn the 2015 Obergefell v. Hodges Supreme Court Case that made same-sex marriage legal nationally. Our current president, Donald Trump, has been found guilty of sexual abuse. Our bodies are being discussed in politics by men who will never know what it feels like to be a woman in America. My intention in writing all of this is not to fearmonger, but to show that Atwood’s novel speaks to the present as much as it does to the past. Her writing and the inspiration behind it do not exist in a vacuum. The Handmaid’s Tale was formed with the help of history and history has a way of repeating itself if no one learns from it. 

I read The Handmaid’s Tale about a month after I’d heard the devastating decision was made to overturn Roe v. Wade on my television. I felt powerless that day. After reading, I realized the book acted as a cautionary tale when experiencing it through 21st-century eyes. Gilead is a version of what the future could look like. If you haven’t read the novel, I highly recommend that you do and see what conclusions you can draw from it. 

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