Context

Question 1

Puritan England: the American settlers

Answer 1

• The SCARLET LETTER (Nathaniel Hawthorne) - the first things they set up were a PRISON + a GALLOWS
• Atwood’s ancestor, MARY WEBSTER, survived an ATTEMPTED HANGING for WITCHCRAFT
• Protestant work ethic: “Your REWARD is in HEAVEN” (endurance, not indulgence. Meagre life)
• Women = NOMINATIVE DETERMINISM : names are what you’ll be (Patience, Silence, Chastity)
• OUTFITS of Puritan women (winged cap) echoed in Handmaiden uniform.

Question 2

Dedicatee Perry Miller

Answer 2

• Harvard PROFESSOR + scholar of AMERICAN PURITANISM
  (Acknowledges historical + scholarly influences)

Question 3

Atwood’s exploration of global women’s rights violations

Answer 3

*1970s IRANIAN REVOLUTION: women forced to cover hair, summary executions via hanging

• GERMANY - DDR + the IRON CURTAIN: wrote Handmaids in West G with warning sonic booms from DDR planes overhead.
• Went behind Iron Curtain, learnt of FREQUENT DISAPPEARANCES .
• ABORTION RIGHTS (AMERICA): 1973 ROE V WADE enshrines abortion as a right in the CONSTITUTION.
• Global movement
• REAGANITE MORAL MAJORITY warns of a ‘BIRTH DEARTH’

Question 4

Religious scripture: GILEAD

Answer 4

• Location of a HEALING BALM. Moira changes it to “there is a bomb in Gilead”

Question 5

Religious Scripture: RACHEL + LEAH

Answer 5

• Polygamy. Fertile Leah bears Jacob’s child in infertile Rachel’s staid.
• Leah (‘wearied/wild cow’) symbol of HUMILITY, less favoured.

Handmaids= Leah, Wives= Rachel

Question 6

Atwood’s childhood

Answer 6

• Born 1939, came to conscience during WW2.
• Knows how quickly things can change. Anywhere.

Question 7

Televangelism

Answer 7

• Tv EVANGELISTS spouting the GOSPEL during the 80s. Part of Moral Majority
• Several prominent female figures travel up + down America making speeches like Serena.