Depiction of the Female Body in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale: Images of the Alienated Female Body Anonymous College

The novel depicts the everyday-life of Offred – the protagonist – in the Republic of Gilead. Gilead is a totalitarian state and society that has replaced the US. The only goal of this new system is to place women into the center while also offering a view of their capabilities, bodies and what they are worth from a whole new perspective. This perspective is, however, not great, as their bodies are objectified and seen only as carriers of the next generation. The Handmaid’s Tale focuses on the main character’s story – while also introducing other females and their stories – throughout this new journey which started as women losing their regular jobs, properties and their own identities. Men became leaders and women are objectified to their inferior decisions.

Atwood states in the novel that women, more precisely, handmaids have become “two-legged wombs” to serve a totalitarian system that alienates their bodies (Atwood 128). However, this alienation appears in all four classes of women: Handmaids, Aunts, Marthas, and Unwomen as well. Handmaids are obviously the ones who can bear children, they are the sterile ones. Aunts are those who are not married and who are not capable of bearing children any longer, they are climaxing....