The Handmaid’s Tale

Allusions in theText

Much of Atwood's language is allusive i.e. she makes allusions (references)

to literature, especially the Bible, and to familiar aspects of our lives.

Analyse the effect of the following allusions and why Atwood

would have chosen them.
Why are Biblical allusions so frequent in this novel?

1. ‘A Sister dipped in blood’ [19/5]

Alludes to the play The Changeling (1623) by Thomas Middleton: “A
woman dipt in blood and talk of modesty.”

2. their red shoes ... and not for dancing [17/4]

Grimm Brothers' fairy story and the film of the same name

3. Some fairytale figure in a red cloak [18/5]

Little Red Riding Hood? – and we know what happened to her!

4. They also serve who only stand and wait. [28/16]

John Milton’s famous sonnet “On His Blindness”, in which a blind man
bewails his inability to serve God properly.

5. Under His Eye [54/40]

George Orwell’s dystopian novel, 1984 – “Big Brother is Watching You.”

6. Forgive them, for they know not what they do. [56/43]
Bible (NT) – the words said by Christ about those who were crucifying
him.

7. Blessed are the meek. She didn't go on to say anything about

inheriting the earth. [74/62]
Blessed be the poor... comforted. [99-100/84]
Alludes to the Bible (NT), the Beatitudes, a sermon given by Christ:
“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” Bible:
Matthew 5.5.

8. Or maybe it's a parlour, the kind with a spider and flies.

[89/73]
Nursery rhyme: “Will you walk into my parlour, said the spider to the
fly.”

9. Context is all. [154/138] Context is all; or is it ripeness?

[202/188]
Shakespeare’s King Lear: “Ripeness is all.”

10. From each according to her ability; to each according to his

needs. [127/110]
Karl Marx: The Communist Manifesto: “From each according to his
ability; to each according to his needs.

11. Pen Is Envy [196/183]

Sigmund Freud’s psychiatric theory of penis envy (All females are
supposed to suffer from it.)
 The Handmaid’s Tale
Allusions in theText
12. Jezebel’s [122/105; Ch. XII]
Bible (OT]

13. I tell, therefore you are. [279/264]

French philosopher Descartes’ theory – “I think therefore I am.”

The dedication: "For Mary Webster and Perry Miller" (Not printed in the
Heinemann edition.)
Perry Miller is the leading authority on the Puritans and their influence on
American History.
Mary Webster is an ancestor of Atwood hanged as a witch in Connecticut.

'Gilead'
Behold thou art fair, my love; behold thou art fair; thou hast doves' eyes within
thy locks: thy hair is as a flock of goats, that appear from [Mount] Gilead.
O.T., Song of Solomon, 4: 1
Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there? why then is not the health
of my people recovered?
O.T.,
Jeremiah
 both rather ironic given the state that has been created.

God hath spoken in his holiness, I will rejoice, and divide Sichem: and mete out
the valley of Succoth. Gilead is mine, and Manasses is mine. . .
Book of Common Prayer

Epigraphs
Genesis One of several passages in the Bible establishing that under
30: 1-3 patriarchal Hebrew law it was perfectly legitimate for a man to have
sex with and father children on his servants or slaves, particularly if
his wife was infertile. It is not known how widespread the custom was
of having the infertile wife embrace the fertile maidservant as she
gave birth to symbolise that the baby was legally hers.
Swift: Swift revealed the hard-heartedness of the English government in
A Modest allowing the Irish people to starve during a time of need by satirically
Proposal proposing that they should be encouraged to eat their own children.
This quotation makes clear that The Handmaid's Tale is a reductio ad
absurdum, designed to stimulate thought about social issues rather
than being a realistic prediction of what might happen in the future.
'Speculative fiction' is Atwood's own term.
Sufi Suggests that there is no need to forbid people to do what they do
Proverb not want to do anyway.

Allusions in the text

 add layers of meaning to the narrative by evoking the associations that go
with the original
 suggest the way the mind works, with sights and events triggering memories
of literature etc
 show how literate Offred is – emphasising how much she must suffer from
being deprived of books
 The Handmaid’s Tale
Allusions in theText
 the distorted and rewritten Biblical texts reinforce how Gilead has corrupted
not just language but even the book they use as the basis of their laws.

13/1 A 'palimpsest' was created when a medieval scribe tried to scrape clean
a parchment in order to reuse it. Sometimes the scraping process was
not complete enough to obliterate all traces of the original text, which
could be read faintly underneath the new one.
Other references to 'echoes' are made throughout. See [296/282]
18/5 Little Red Riding Hood
19/6 The New Testament gospels: Martha was one of two sisters. She devoted
herself to housework while her sister Mary sat and listened to Jesus. The
irony here is that Jesus praised Mary, not Martha; but the new patriarchy
has chosen Martha as the ideal.
26/14 Tammy Fay Bakker was an active opponent in the campaign to defeat the
passage of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) in the USA, an
Amendment to the Constitution that would have guaranteed equal rights
for women. Anita Bryant, blonde singer, was another. The description of
Serena Joy bears considerable resemblance to both.
27/15 The names of the cars are all from the Old Testament
28/16 "Some of you will fall on dry ground or thorns." NT, Mark 4:1-9, the
parable of the sower and seed.
32/21 "Me and My Shadow" – classic song written by Dave Dreyer, Billy Rose
and Al Jolson; used in many films, the first being Evelyn Prentice (1934).
It is a song about loneliness; a repeated line is "All alone and feeling
blue."
35/24 Katherine Hepburn and Lauren Bacall both played women known for
their independence, their courage, their liveliness, their assertiveness –
everything that is no longer allowed.
35/24 From the Bible (NT): “Consider the lilies of the field; Solomon in all his
splendour was not arrayed as one of these. Matthew 6:28.
35/24 "A land flowing with milk and honey" is a description from the OT, used
to describe Canaan, the "Promised Land."
43/33 "... evidence from a single woman is no longer admissible" - based on
Islamic tradition.
53/40 During World War II, the opening rhythmic pattern from Beethoven's Fifth
Symphony was interpreted as the Morse code for "v" (dot dot dot dash),
and used to symbolise "victory".
55/41 "All flesh is grass" is from Isaiah 40: 6; means all humans are mortal.
55/41- Serena Joy's campaigning for the sanctity of the home is a satire on the
2 career of Phyllis Shlafley, lawyer, right-wing activist, and co-founder of
the Eagle Forum, who put most of her energy for many years into
leading the fight against the ERA while admonishing other women to
stay home and raise their children.
56/42 The Shape of Things to Come = the title of a novel by H. G. Wells
57/44 The use of tokens for food, the unavailability of steak reminds of the
rationing during World War 2.
64/51 lyrics (slightly inaccurate) from Elvis Presley's 1956 No. 1 hit "Heartbreak
Hotel"
71/58 "Give me children, or else I die." - from Genesis 30: 1.
 The Handmaid’s Tale
Allusions in theText
71/58 "They have to catch you in the act with two witnesses." Deuteronomy
17: 6 requires that for a couple to be stoned to death on account of
adultery there have to be two witnesses to the act.
72/60 "But every woman that prayeth... with her head uncovered,
dishonoureth her head... let her also be shorn... Neither was the man
created for the woman but the woman for the man." 1 Corinthians 11
75/63 "that film" - she is remembering scenes from the end of World War II, in
which women who dated the Nazi occupiers had their heads shaved in
public.
90/74 'Lily of the Valley', the name of the perfume, comes not from the flower
but from the Bible: The Song of Solomon 1: 2.
92/76 The reference to a Montreal satellite station reminds us that Atwood is a
Canadian. Montreal is evidently outside of the territory controlled by
Gilead.
93/77 The endless war, always on the brink of victory, is very reminiscent of
the war depicted in Orwell's Nineteen-Eighty-Four.

93/78 "The Children of Ham" is a designation for African-Americans, based on

the supposed descent of Black races from Ham, one of the three children
of Noah. The pernicious policy of enslavement was often justified by the
OT story of Ham's accidentally seeing his drunken father naked and
laughing; he and his descendents were cursed to forever serve his
brothers and their descendents.
99/83 The Commander reads from Genesis 8: 17 and 30: 1-8.
99/84 the Beatitudes, Matthew 5: 3-10
101/85 Genesis 30: 18.
108/93 "The moon on the breast of the new fallen snow." is from R.W. Emerson's
"Account of a Visit of St Nicholas", better known as "The Night Before
Christmas"
Away to the window I flew like a flash, /Tore open the shutters, and threw
up the sash.
The moon on the breast of the new fallen snow, /Gave the lustre of mid-
day to objects below…
119/10 In thinking about the missing cushions, Offred is referring to 1
2 Corinthians 13: 13. "And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three;
but the greatest of these is charity."

124/10 There are two sides to the question of medical intervention in the natural
7 process of giving birth. Some argue strongly for natural childbirth;
others see this as a step backward. Atwood points out that it was
modern medicine that first made pain relief possible during childbirth -
though it was at first denounced by preachers who cited the passage
quoted here, from Genesis 3, 16. Anaesthetics used during childbirth can
be harmful to the infant, but they can also be very beneficial for the
mother. This example illustrates well Atwood's general approach in this
novel: opposing positions on issues are both depicted as too extreme.
124/10 "I will greatly multiply thy sorrow. . .
7
125/10 'Agent Orange' was the defoliant widely used on the forests of Vietnam;
7 it was later blamed for many health problems among soldiers.
1127/1 Birthing stools were once in widespread use and have been reintroduced
10 by women who argue that giving birth in a sitting position is both more
 The Handmaid’s Tale
Allusions in theText
natural and more comfortable.
129/11 'Take Back the Night' originated as the slogan of Women Against
3 Pornography, but has developed in more recent years into an anti-rape
slogan.
156/14 In ancient medicine, hysteria was a disease of women, supposedly
1 caused by unnatural movements of the womb.
161/14 "A Tennyson garden" – alludes to the Victorian poet Alfred, Lord
5 Tennyson. From "The Gardener's Daughter": Down which a well-
worn pathway courted us
To one green wicket in a privet hedge;
This, yielding, gave into a grassy walk
Through crowded lilac-ambush trimly pruned:
And one warm gust, full-fed with perfume, blew
Beyond us, as we enter'd in the cool.
The garden stretches southward. In the midst
A cedar spread his dark-green layers of shade.
The garden-glasses shone, and momently
The twinkling laurel scatter'd silver lights.
166/15 "My wife doesn't understand me" is such an old cliché as uttered by men
1 trying to start an affair that it has become a joke.
172/15 A British expression for pregnancy = having "a bun in the oven."
8
173/15 “Loaves and Fishes” refers to the story of one of Christ's miracles, when
9 he fed 5000 people with only two loaves and five fishes; told in the
Gospels (St Mark 6: 34-44).
176/16 The Soul Scroll machines are similar to Tibetan prayer wheels, which are
2 turned to activate the prayers inside them. Also reminiscent of the old
Catholic practice of paying priests and monks to say prayers for the
repose of the dead.
182/16 "Discothèques" = nightclubs with recorded rather than live music; they
8 originated in France. The name was soon abbreviated to 'disco'.
182/16 The main feature of the Old Testament Book of Job (pronounced 'jōbe') is
8 his intense suffering to test his faith.
187/17 The law in Gilead prohibiting the ownership of property by women
4 reinstates the law as it stood in the 19th century and earlier.
203/19 Offred rewrites 'The Lord's Prayer':
1 Our Father, which art in heaven, which is within
Hallowed be thy name
Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on I don't believe for an
earth as it is in heaven; instance that what's going
on out here is what you
meant.
Give us this day our daily bread, … choking on it
And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive Don't worry about
those who trespass against us; forgiving me
Lead us not into temptation but deliver us Knowing was a temptation
from evil,
For Thine is the kingdom, the power and the You must feel pretty
glory, ripped off.
Forever and ever, Amen

211/19 Jews were forced to convert to Christianity in Spain and other Catholic
5 European countries, especially under the Inquisition of C14 – C16. Many
were burned at the stake even when they did convert.
 The Handmaid’s Tale
Allusions in theText
211/19 Torahs are scrolls on which is written the Pentateuch (the first five books
5 of the Old Testament). Taliths are the prayer shawls worn by Jews.
Magen Davids are Stars of David, symbols of Judaism.
211/19 Jesuits = the Society of Jesus, a branch of the Catholic Church; Jehovah's
5 Witnesses = a protestant denomination. Jacob = one of the patriarchs of
the Jewish faith.
218/20 "Little Aztec hearts." The Aztecs were a pre-Columbian American people
2 who removed human hearts from living victims in ritual sacrifice.
230/21 Arranged marriages were the rule rather than the exception in Western
4 civilisation until a couple of centuries ago; they are still the usual
practice in many (most?) parts of the world. The followers of the Rev
Moon (Moonies) have mass weddings, where bride and groom meet for
the first time.
233/21 "I will that women adorn themselves in modest apparel..." - 1 Timothy 2:
7 9-15.
242/22 The bonfires of sexy clothes etc are reminiscent of the similar fires in
7 Florence under the religious tyranny of the monk Savonarola in the
1490s, when not just pretty clothes but paintings etc were burnt in the
excitement of religious zeal. The Nazis burned 'subversive' books, of
course.
250/23 Moira's costume is that of a Bunny Girl; they were waitresses in Playboy
7 Clubs, which had their heyday in the late '60s and '70s.
254/24 'The Whore of Babylon' = a term applied to the Roman Catholic Church
1 by the early Puritans, referring to N.T., Revelations 17.
257/24 Quakers = members of the Society of Friends. They are pacifist and
4 open-minded. One of the ironies is that they have been outlawed from
Gilead, yet were among the original settlers of the USA, looking for
religious freedom. Unfortunately for them (in Gilead terms) is their belief
that every person - male or female, slave or free - is of equal worth. The
early Quakers were very active in the anti-slavery movement.
239/22 "White Russians" was the name given to refugees from Russian the first
4 few years after the Bolshevik Revolution, which put the 'Reds' into power.
266/25 Cinderella, of course.
4
274/26 'Abstinence' instead of 'Absence makes the heart grow fonder."
0
290/27 The Canadian government promoted the term 'participaction' for
5 'participant action'.
298/28 "She has died that I may live" is a parody of "He died that we may live,"
4 a central Christian doctrine referring to Christ's crucifixion as a source of
salvation for believers.
311/29 There is a long tradition of 'nowhere' names in utopian/dystopian fiction.
3 "Utopia" means "nowhere" and Samuel Butler called his utopia Erewhon.
The Chairwoman comes from the University of "deny" which is in the
country of "none of it."
311/29 The Northwest Territories in Canada have two large native groups - the
3 Dene (read 'Denay') in the Western Arctic and the Inuit in the Eastern
Arctic – and are divided into two massive land areas known as Denendeh
and Nunavut. 'Nunavut' means 'Our Land' to the Inuit. Atwood has
changed the spelling of 'Nunavut' to 'Nunavit'; 'Nuna' still means 'land'
and 'vit' may mean 'to live'.
312/29 Krishna is the erotic lover in Hindu mythology and Kali the also erotic
 The Handmaid’s Tale
Allusions in theText
4 avenging demon slaying goddess
312/29 The 'Warsaw Tactic': the Nazis walled up Warsaw's Jews in the ghetto and
4 systematically exterminated them.
312/29 Iran's conservative Islamic revolution involved strenuous
4 demodernisation and drastic restrictions on the freedom of women.
313/29 The title which Offred's narrative has been given alludes to those of
5 Chaucer's Canterbury Tales: "The Knight's Tale", "The Wife of Bath's Tale"
etc.
314/29 Boy George = a gay transvestite singer; Twisted Sister = amusingly
6 appropriate name
315/29 William Wordsworth famously defined poetry as "emotion recollected in
7 tranquillity."
319/30 National Homelands are like the areas set aside in South Africa for the
3 Bantu tribes under apartheid.