The Handmaids Tale Essay Example for Free

The retainers Tale EssayGileads totalitarianism regime uses religion to meet the ends of the regime, rather than the regime being a means to operate matinee idol. instinct Scrolls is a place where Handmaids purchase one of five invocations to be read to them, before being recycled. Offreds prayer is a distortion of the Lords Prayer which is ostensibly much more personal to her. Offred describes intelligence Scrolls as a franchise. This suggests the presence of business and engineering science in Gilead, reinforced by the idea that the Handmaids accounts atomic number 18 debited and that the regime is everywhere. This concept of business is continuous throughout the novel, for example the ceremony previously discussed is impersonateed to be a business transaction. Franchise has connotations of something which is unavoidable. evenrybody knows it and everybody has access to it, and its the same everywhere you go its incredibly impersonal. Gilead uses nous Scrolls as a mea ns of controlling the Handmaids. There is no flexibility because there is no choice in prayer there are entirely five prayers to pack from, which seems quite artificial.In only offering five exact choices health, wealth, a death, a birth, a sin, it prevents mint praying for anything else. Despite the fact that the Handmaids can mentally think of other prayers, they can never articulate this because their freedom of speech is subverted to the state of Gilead. Birth and death are rites of passage and for the Handmaids its the only two things they can be certain of.They exist but for the purpose to bear children, and constant reminders of the consequences if they fail to conceive are that they will eventually die. With only 5 prayers available, this creates uniformity which shows how Gilead manipulates religion, because in reality, prayer should be different for everyone. The concept of Christianity is based on the relationship between God and the person. Prayer is theoretically supposed to be a means of personal communication, a way to thank God, and to wish for things to happen.Soul Scrolls is not personal. The machines talk and by speaking in a toneless metallic voice, Gilead is taking all freedom from the Handmaids minds, and this autonomy removes any need for a thought process, which means the Handmaids cannot threaten the Gilead regime by thinking for themselves. Soul Scrolls allegedly teach the Handmaids what they should think. However, their soul is a part of them and they should already know what they wishing to think, but the absence of this suggests the influence and power of Gilead.The idea that the Handmaids minds are also controlled is emphasised by this because Gilead doesnt let them develop, it uses machines and the role of people much(prenominal) as aunts and commanders to brainwash them. Regardless of the Handmaids being unable to elicit their thoughts, since God is omniscient he should know what theyre thinking. However, in articulati ng their thoughts they could confirm their own beliefs to themselves in a pragmatic way. It forms a part of positive thinking in the concept that the more you repeat it the better a chance they have of getting what they want.There is also a value in articulating feelings to people you love because its comforting. God is a conscious vivification entity aware of peoples love. Nevertheless, Gilead completely restricts this because the Handmaids have been brainwashed for so long that its wrong to think and to have these feelings, and so this restricts the power that the Handmaids could have. Soul scrolls is only one way communication from the machine to the Handmaid, and this stops them developing thoughts, making the Soul Scrolls simply another way of controlling the Handmaids.Soul Scrolls are described by the Wives to help their husbands career, which shows the machines to be pragmatic and simply a way to get ahead and follow the regime. Soul Scrolls also suggests that the regime is manipulative because it shows a yearning for money and power in charging for the prayers to be read, and in controlling the Handmaids. In buying prayers, its a sign of faithfulness to the regime, which implies that the regime has completely replaced religion and which emphasises that the Commander is thought to be like a God.Gilead completely distorts the meaning of prayer because with Soul Scrolls its not about connecting with God, and in prayer you should want to pray which is not what this is about. Atwoods repetition of punching in the numbers reinforces this sense of autonomy and contempt for the regime, because it appears instant and tedious. Offred describes it as having roll upon roll of prayers, which shows Gilead believes in quantity not quality, further emphasising the concept of business and money. Gileads regime is described as indestructible.The window of Soul scrolls is shatterproof, which suggests that for the regime to have protected the franchise, they must have f eared there would be dissenters. It suggests that not everybody in Gilead accepts it but they dont dare to express this because of the consequences. There is reference to the spies in Soul Scrolls, each machine has an eye painted in gold on the side, which shows their superiority and that the Handmaids are forever and a day being watched there is no escape and this is yet another means of controlling them.Offred tries to remember what the place sold before and realises it was a lingerie shop. This takes remote the feminist aspect of women because Gilead attempts to strip women of any wants and thoughts, to make them only want to bear children. If a lingerie shop existed in Gileads society as it were then, it would be considered corrupt, which is ironic because Gilead itself is a mire of corruption. The concept of a patriarchal society is reinforced in that most of the stores carrying things for men are still exonerated.Offreds parody of the Lords Prayer, which takes place by an empty garden (similar to how Jesus prayed alone in the Garden of Gethsemane), articulates Offreds feelings of abandonment and despair. course of instruction by line, such as Who Art in the kingdom of heaven, she regurgitates the sentiments of the Lords Prayer, typically used at ceremonies (the irony being in comparison to her experience of ceremonies), and in private commitment to express needs and holds. Offred dwells on metaphors of heaven, hell, daily bread, and forgiveness, from which arises a lot of the absent chandelier where her predecessor attached a noose.This shows Offreds despair because throughout a hopeful prayer she arrives at the conclusion that dying is the only option. Offred tediously recites the recurrent line from a tombstone in Gileads cemetery, and condescension her attempts to remain In hope Offred suffers so much isolation that her prayer becomes a desperate cry for spiritual nourishment. Offred concludes with a plaintive rhetorical question, How can I k eep on living? which emphasises her unhappiness within Gilead and her want to end it all.Offred continually refers to God as You, which shows her yearning to be personal with God and to have a personal relationship. Atwood refers God as you because it personifies God present Offred as trying to talk to him personally. She wishes she knew Your name, which implies she needs God to answer her. She describes her thoughts as hell we can make for ourselves, which suggests that the hell is Gilead itself. Offred is uncertain about her efficiency to find out about whats happening in Gilead.The Fall was a fall from innocence to knowledge is a reference to Adam and Eves loss of innocence after they disobeyed God and tasted the Tree of Knowledge. Offred applies this to herself because Gilead teaches that knowledge is dire and that they will no longer be innocent if they think such knowledge (the irony being that they were never innocent in Gileads corrupt regime). This suggests that if Offre d was to find out about what was happening, this would be a sin, and this also reinforces Gileads influence in terms of how they brainwash the Handmaids with bible stories.Offred avoids the traditional posture of praying I dont even close my eyeball. This is because it would draw guardianship to her and also shows that she is afraid of the consequences if she was found to be personally praying, and so this informal prayer becomes her only way of communicating with God. The equal darkness even when her eyes are closed implies that nothing goes away because its too hard. However, there is potential optimism within Offred. Or light suggests that there could be hope for Offred, notwithstanding that Gilead takes this hope.This informal way of praying seems like shes not fully committed but she still wants to pray because shes desperate. Soul scrolls is very impersonal in comparison to Offreds own prayer. All thought process is removed, unlike how Offred can reflect in her mind during her own prayer. In her own prayer, despite Offred not being completely committed, she does get the opportunity to think about whats happening in Gilead. In Soul Scrolls, Offred cannot do this because she may be caught and also because the autonomous voices prevent her from thinking.Offreds own prayer becomes much like a desperate cry for help and the purpose of her prayer is to portray to the reader just how distressed she is. On the other hand, Offred commits to Soul Scrolls because she has too since its a sign of faithfulness to Gileads regime, and if she didnt, it would seem suspicious, even if she doesnt believe in doing it. However, both do criticise Gilead, with Soul Scrolls expressing the pointlessness of it, and her own personal prayer expressing how Gilead is a hell.In her own personal prayer, Offred has hope for two way communications, and although his name is not known, God does offer some kind of contemplation for Offred, as she works her way through her feelings. Soul scrolls is simply a one way communication because prayers are printed and read to the Handmaids before being recycled, which shows the uniformity of this prayer. Offreds own prayer is also in a sense a rebellion from the constraints of Gilead, because although this isnt her aim, it does go against what Gilead teaches that she should not be thinking for herself.When Offred visits Soul Scrolls, she is complying with the ways of Gilead simply to stay out of trouble. In conclusion, Offreds personal prayer is much more personal than Soul Scrolls, and despite it being a distorted version of the Lords prayer, it does signify her despondency for salvation from the regime. Soul Scrolls is something Offred simply goes along with because she has no choice but too, and this offers her no answers to her thoughts because of how autonomous and controlled it is.