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The Handmaid's Tale
A dystopian society is an imaginary place where the citizens lead dehumanized and very fearful lives. In The Handmaid's tale by Margaret Atwood, the nightmares for women, associated with procreation and fertility lead to this dystopian society. Atwood creates this dystopic novel using the distinct ideas of anti-feminism and the nature of power to demonstrate that the only purpose women serve in society is as baby-machines and sex objects.
The Handmaid's tale is the perfect example of "the twentieth-century tradition of anti-utopian, or dystopian novel." Procreation, fertility and maternity, for women, lead to this dystopian society. The Handmaid's tale is a novel that considers different aspects of Gilead, "a group of religious extremists that has taken power and turned sexual revolution on its head." Gilead causes this dystopian society, by overpowering the women citizens, by forcing the fertile ones to live in higher status households as sexual surrogates, and the infertile ones to clean up toxic waste. Offred is the extremely complex lead character in the novel, which brings us into the corrupt and oppressive world of Gilead. Offred is a handmaid, a women who lives in a household, run by high-ranking officials called the Commander, and his wife. The wife is unable to have children; therefore the handmaids must have sex with the Commanders to keep up society's population...