not the ending i was expecting

I have finished reading The Handmaid’s Tale this past week and I have to say I’m a bit unhappy with the ending. Towards the end of the book, a new Ofglen was introduced. I thought she was incredibly weird compared to the previous Ofglen. When I found out that Ofglen had hanged herself, I was sad that she caused her own death. I’m pretty sure I would’ve been sadder if she was murdered. Either way, Ofglen’s death was not something I anticipated. In the last chapter of the book, Offred was taken away into a van by the Eyes. Before being taken away, Nick told Offred that the two men were actually with Mayday, but Offred found that difficult to believe because the Eyes surely would know about Mayday. If I was in Offred’s position, I would’ve been hesitant as well just like her. However, I would not have gotten into the van. The book ends with Historical Notes on The Handmaid’s Tale. Here we find out that the Republic of Gilead no longer exists and the fate of Offred was never discovered. I thought this ending was terrible because it was like a cliffhanger. I’m pretty sure everybody who has read this book was very into it towards the end, but became upset after the sudden ending. Offred’s fate after going into the van should’ve been clarified.

thinking about history

Chapter 38 of The Handmaid’s Tale talked about Moira’s attempted escape. She would move from one house to another with only the previous people helping her know where she is headed and nothing else. This path to freedom is called the Underground Femaleroad. As soon as I read those words I immediately thought of the Underground Railroad. The Underground Femaleroad parallels the Underground Railroad in that they both attempt to free “slaves” from their current positions by guiding them up north. This movement shows that there are people in the book who despise what some women have to go through, and I really favor that aspect. Sadly, but obviously, Moira was unsuccessful in her attempted escape as she was captured while trying to board a boat. What I would like to know is exactly how Moira’s escape attempt was leaked. Even she doesn’t know because she has to speculate about how the Eyes surrounded the area. After learning that Moira’s attempted escape failed, it made me wonder about how many other women have tried to escape. Not only that, but how many were successful? Or unsuccessful?

new technique doesnt work for me

In class today we did this new technique where we read out loud and then just interrupt ourselves with our thoughts. The process seems like a big hassle; it’s time-consuming as we interrupt ourselves and it’s also difficult to maintain my place on the page as I let my thoughts wander. Although this may be an effective reading technique for some people, it does not work for me. As I continue to read The Handmaid’s Tale, it seems that Offred and the Commander are quite enjoying their meetings together. The Commander is beginning to drink and the two continue to play Scrabble. Sometimes, the Commander even drinks as he plays, which causes him to get a little silly. If I was Offred in that certain situation, I would be a little hesitant in the presence of the Commander. Being under the influence of alcohol, some words or actions may be expressed that can possibly ill-affect Offred, such as being struck as the Commander fails to win at Scrabble.

this is starting to become tedious

In the beginning of chapter 24, Offred reveals that her name is Offred now, which means she used to go by another name. However, her former name isn’t revealed and she has to forget secret name and past life. No matter what experiences she may have gone or will go through, I do not believe she will ever be able to forget about her past. Such memories are encoded and stored within the mind for the rest someone’s life. Offred also reveals that she is thirty-three years old with brown hair. Given that description, it confirmed my belief that she is a young and pretty woman. In chapter 25, an arrangement is made where Offred visits the Commander two or three nights a week. In this society, a handmaid is only supposed to be with a Commander once a month as an attempt to become pregnant. However, by visiting multiple times a week, it seems that interaction between the Commander and handmaid are no longer just strictly business. To me, the continuous interaction means that the two are meeting more for pleasure now. The only problem with this is how the society views handmaids. Handmaids are only there for reproduction and Commanders should have pleasure with their wife instead of the handmaid. This “norm” of society seems to be questioned by this certain situation and it makes me curious to know what might happen if it was revealed.

it's just gotten very strange

I have recently read chapters 21-23 of The Handmaid’s Tale and chapter 21 was mostly about a woman, Janine, giving birth to a baby girl. However, although Janine is the mother of the child, it is the wife of the Commander who keeps the child. I see that as splitting apart the bond between a mother and her child. It should be the birth mother’s decision as to what happens to the baby. To make matters worse, Janine doesn’t get to name the baby; it’s the Commander’s wife who names the baby instead, Angela. I view that as taking two things from a mother who will never get them back: the naming of the baby and the bond between the two. That should never happen in any society. Of the three chapters that I recently read, I found chapter 23 the most disturbing. The Commander invites the narrator, Offred, to play Scrabble with him. The first thoughts that came to my mind were “how does he know whether she can read or not?” and “should Offred play and reveal she can read or act like she can’t?” I thought she would play dumb, but I found out I was wrong as I continued to read. After Offred revealed that she can read, I was unsure how the Commander would react. His response just utterly caught me by surprise; he told Offred he wanted her to kiss him. That whole situation was completely awkward, and it made the Commander seem like a slave master who just does whatever he wants.

here we go again

In class we are reading another book. This one is called The Handmaid’s Tale. I was not looking forward to it at all after reading such a long book in The Left Hand of Darkness. Fortunately, after reading the beginning of The Handmaid’s Tale, it was much easier to read and understand compared to The Left Hand of Darkness. I found myself somewhat interested, even though it was pretty confusing at first. Initially, after reading the back of the book and some attention-grabbing chapters, I wondered about how this society came about. As we were discussing some questions in groups in class today, I was told that there had been some sort of nuclear war in this story. However, I still do not know how the nuclear war even occurred. Also, after reading how the narrator, Offred, talks about her husband and child, I assumed that they were killed during the nuclear war and she now misses and reminiscences about them a whole lot. As for the part where handmaids have sex with the commander, it seems unreal that the women would allow that to happen to them. Although Offred mentioned that she had a choice in the matter and she chose to be with the commander, I don’t believe that was a good choice at all. Before Offred mentioned that was what she chose, it would have been nice to know what her other choices were.

a whole new story

When I first read the story, “When It Changed,” I initially thought that the main character was a male. In the first sentence of the second paragraph, it said “Katy and I have three children between us” and that made me think of a husband. However, it wasn’t until later on that I found out that the men died out generations ago that I realized that the main character was a female. After the men died out, it made me wonder about how the women reproduced and have children. Unless it was something really bizarre, like in Left Hand of Darkness, I didn’t quite understand how reproduction was possible. Also, another interesting fact that I noticed was that the women were really short, midgets by our standards. For them, one meter was already extremely tall. That put into perspective just how short the rest of the population must be; the average height may have only been around 0.75 meter. Later on in the story, Katy tried to shoot one of the men who came to Whileaway. Afterwards, she was shaking and said that she never touches a rifle because she knew she’d kill someone. I believe that the author, Joanna Russ, was trying to show that even in a society without men, destructive human traits still exist. In this case, Russ showed that women are also capable of killing others.