Power and Control

The easy assumption to make with regards to the characters in The Handmaid's Tale is that the men have the power in society, and use said power to control the women. After all, it is only men who are allowed to hold property, and women are not even supposed to look men in the eye. Women are there purely for their fertility and gift of childbirth, some might argue. However, after finishing the novel I have begun to see it differently. There is not one superior gender, and women are viewed to be just as important as men, since without them the population of Gilead would suffer.

It can be argued that Gilead is actually a very matriarchal society. Women fall into neatly organized ranks, ranging from the Aunts, to Wives, to Marthas to Handmaids. Every woman knows her place and no woman is "serving" a man, so to speak. Instead, women report to to and work for other women. If a handmaid acts in an inappropriate manner, it is the Wife's job to punish her, not the Commander's.

Although they have almost no say in their own lives (meals are monitored, their clothes are chosen for them, their socializing is minimal), handmaids play a crucial role in Gilead and therefore enjoy a taste of power in their own way. When the commander requests that Offred joins him for nightly Scrabble games, Offred remarks, "It's difficult for me to believe I have power over him, of any sort, but I do; although it's of an equivocal kind...there are things he wants to prove to me, gifts he wants to bestow, services he wants to render, tendernesses he wants to inspire," (Atwood, 221).

However, it does appear as though men enjoy the taste of dominance that they appear to have. Luke doesn't understand Offred's anger and frustration when she is stripped of her possessions and legally becomes reliant and subservient to him. Likewise, the Commander takes advantage of his position and privileges. "Perhaps he's reached that state of intoxication which power is said to inspire, the state in which you believe you are indispensable and can therefore do anything, absolutely anything you feel like, anything at all," Offred says (Atwood, 248). Another example of men having power over women is at Jezebels, a sort of brothel-type establishment not so dissimilar to a modern day strip club. Moira states that men "like to see you all painted up. Just another crummy power trip," (Atwood, 255).

Something that I liked about The Handmaid's Tale is that the reader never really is sure about who has the true supremacy. The men might hold the more authoritative roles, but handmaids have the ever-important job of having children. It is never clear who wins the power-struggle between the genders, but both men and women experience the thrill of having power and the misery of having none throughout the story.