Our Shared Shelf discussion

I have just finished reading 'The Handmaid's Tale', and I wondered what everyone's thoughts were on the ending? Do you think Offred is being taken away to be executed etc or do you think Nick was telling the truth and it was a Mayday?? Serena clearly hadn't called the guardian's and I don't think the Commander would have been involved either. I'd be interested to hear all your thoughts and ideas.

I also had a lot of questions, but then I read the epilogue (the historical notes) and after analyzing that I found some stronger conclusions, including what happened to Offred and how Gilead came to be and what the social structure was as an overall.

The spark notes also gives some interesting insights, link below, but I would recommend you give it a read or two first and draw your own conclusions.

http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/handmai...

Jen wrote: "I have just finished reading 'The Handmaid's Tale', and I wondered what everyone's thoughts were on the ending? Do you think Offred is being taken away to be executed etc or do you think Nick was t..."

I agree with Winston. The epilogue answered, at least alluded to, the outcome for Offred and Gilead. Right off the bat, the scholar conducting that seminar is a woman, which I think is telling. (view spoiler)[Gilead did not spread globally and in fact is gone. Offred did get to record the tapes.... (hide spoiler)] Also, giving absolute detail of what happened to Offred would undermine the message of precariousness in the situation.

It´s a bit understanding the end. I don´t know what happens with her. She died or She can escap?

(view spoiler)[Yes but Offerd is definitely rescued at the very end and escape the Commander, then she makes the tapes, which were found in Maine. It was likely Nick that helped. The journey after if totally open to interpretation, but the means that we have this story requires that Offred survived the van. It also examines the fact that Gilead rose from multiple inner and outer factors. The role of Participation and how popular it was. That the society that arose continued patriarchy tendencies, though much more subtle than in Gilead. (hide spoiler)]I think it's all interesting and everyone should read it.

Thanks for all your comments. I began this thread before I actually read the epilogue at the end! Having read that, it does seem to veer towards Offred escaping. Either way, I really 'enjoyed' reading this book and found it very thought provoking. I always like to hear people's opinions on books that I have read.

If we did not have the epilogue with the academic congress, the ending would be more of an open thing. As it is, I believe there isn't really much room to interpretation -Offred was rescued by the Mayday Resistance.

We are left, though, some room to an open ending in the form of the fate of her family -her daughter and her husband in the pre-Gilead world. We know for certain that the former was, indeed, alive and under Gilead's children relocation system. As for Luke, there is no way to know what happened to him.

Personally, I think Offred escaped but did not necessarily have a happy ending. I highly doubt she ever saw her relatives again, and the lack of further findings on her story post-Gilead life is not a good hint.

Also is it just me or did the epilogue feel a little...disturbing, too? Perhaps it was just the general feeling after having read such a charged book, but it still felt somewhat creepy to me.

P.S. I would be interested to know what you people think of Ofglen II. Offred's encounter with her takes place right before the ending...for all the fear that she felt upon their short, terrifying dialogue, I wondered whether Ofglen II was still another Mayday. Or maybe Nick truly came in time to save her before Ofglen II truly reported her.

Ana wrote: "If we did not have the epilogue with the academic congress, the ending would be more of an open thing. As it is, I believe there isn't really much room to interpretation -Offred was rescued by the ..."

I feel sad for the original Ofglen. I had thought she would be able to escape. I think her replacement was not part of their group and was in reality a spy. A reluctant one if she chose to warn Offred.

Confession! I didn't read the historical notes. BUT I love that the ending is open ended. I love that we can decide for ourselves what happened for her, whether she was okay or not. But I will go back and read the hist notes after having read this thread lol

I am curious as to how the TV show will handle it. Will they leave it open or take a positive or negative approach. Would the story more important the message clarity be improved if a definitive end was used. I am not sure.

So I totally took for granted that it told us that the driver was both the eye and the mayday rescuer... and that Offred made it to Maine through Mayday, but didn't make it out of the country hence why she didn't create any other historical document or recording.

Reading the historical notes and finding out the entire story is a transcript was something I missed when I first read it. At the time I was confused by the lack of speech marks but the historical notes are interesting in themselves. I think its paramount to situating the text in "historical context".

I like to think Offred made it out, but like history, you can never be sure.

I like how it was left open...the fact that the tapes were made at all seems to indicate that Nick was part of the Mayday Resistance, which got her out of the Commander's house. But the tapes being left in the country? That's more puzzling. If she had made it out of Gilead, she would have taped her story once she escaped, right? Once she was in a safer place?
Maybe she thought she would be caught and didn't want her story to be lost. Maybe she managed to hide the tapes before being recaptured and sentenced to the colonies (or Jezebel). Or maybe she didn't want incriminating evidence on her person during an escape.
I'm not sure, but I think that uncertainty is a great ending for this book, especially given how the story is positioned in the epilogue. It feels more realistic that we don't know for sure what happened to her.

I read an article about the inclusion of people of color in the TV show, and that article mentioned that the book was partly based in U.S. slave history. I didn't feel that was strongly true until I got to the epilogue, then I realized it was very much like how we talk about slaves on the underground railroad. I felt, couldn't I have just read stories of slaves instead of this book? What is the value of having a fiction story versus a real story? Having it be about women instead of Africans or African Americans? Do we explain away motivations for real stories esp. if the oppressor group is still in power? So, I understood the ending if I related it to the 19th century, when very few records were taken and escaped slaves might be returned or imprisoned. I took it as a commentary on how we view history and oppression - less on women's rights.

I like the open final. In my mind, Nick ask Mayday to rescue Offeed when he found out that Serena Joy had discovered lipstick on her clothes. He did so, to save his baby. Mayday hide her for a while, somewhere with an old recorder device near Main.
Personally, I think she didn't make it to Canada. Maybe she was recapture, send to the Jezebel, the colonies, or kill. But maybe, she refused to leave the country without her daghter. Serena Joy knew where the child was. Maybe she decided to reenter into the Gilead sociaty as a Mayday operative, working for them, while trying to find her daughter. Maybe someone in Mayday, convinced her to work for them using the posibility of finding her daughter as a reward ( or using the child as a leverage). In my opinion, this last possibility fits better with Offred as a character.

(view spoiler)[I'm with many of you that think that she was rescued by someone, even if it wasn't Mayday, because she had to make the tapes. (hide spoiler)] I want to have a whole discussion of the epilogue, though. Especially when you listen to the Audible version, the guy giving the talk on Gilead is a real piece of work.

I think the lack of detailed information is not a sign that Offred didn't make it all the way to freedom. When we consider the likely international ramifications of the fertility issues which impacted the US, (specifically that whether it was environmental or an STD or something else it wouldn't have been stopped by a border) there may have been upheaval elsewhere. Even with current technology, how easy is it to find out what happened to people you knew even ten years ago? The epilogue includes discussion of periods of Gilead, which tells me it lasted for some time, which only increases the amount of time between the story and the epilogue. When the speaker also discusses that the names were likely pseudonyms and that Offred's real name is never mentioned, it would be nearly impossible to track her further life down.

Honestly, for some reason, I feel like Nick was right about the May Day thing. I know that Aunt Lydia said that they won't tell the crimes anymore when executing so that it won't give anybody ideas, but it was the Commander who asked what she has done wrong and he is in a high position. The fact that they couldn't tell him kind of made me think that she was being saved.

I was extremely annoyed by the ending. I hate when story tellers leave it up to the reader to decide what happens. I just think it's spineless.

The way I interpreted the ending was that she escaped and she was recounting her own story. She could have been captured and telling her story but I prefer to think she made it out. It feels as if she is sharing her journey, writing it down so that future escapees or historians may have an under standing of what her life during Gilead was like.

Oh, so I wrote this somewhere else, but I don't think that was the place to put it. So, apologies, I will add it again.

I wanted to address this because it ---the ending tried to wrap up the story as if it was the past, but it used a clinical setting to do that--- really annoyed me as well. And that is what I imagine Atwood wanted. Even after her publisher raised a quizzical brow.

There are two things at play here that I felt pulled on the themes of the book
- Voice
- Acceptance

Voice: It was a MALE professor who gave the lecture, right?
- So you as a reader have to decide... did things actually get better? Are we in an equal society once again? OR Do men still have most of the positions of power?
- Atwood takes us out of the fantasy world of Gilead into a setting that is eerily familiar. So you begin to squint and question it, looking for traps. You just came from a dystopian-sick-to-your-stomach-no-hope-world... that you have to be a bit trigger shy and wonder what is the catch. What's wrong with this one? And because it was such a familiar setting, you hopefully begin to question where are all the female professors? Will you begin to wonder about hiring practices or demographics in your own actual job? Start to wonder where are all the female leaders: CEO's, presidents, Chief Scientists are in our world. etc.
- And because it was a male professor, we have to question: Did he do a good job at interpreting and honoring Offred's point of view - and/or - did he add some bias to it? He mentioned that the handmaid's tale was one of the only verified account. Either they were silenced or their tales did not survive; only cheap knock offs exist. "We were the people who were not in the papers. We lived in the blank white spaces at the edges of print. It gave us more freedom. We lived in the gaps between stories"

The whole book was trying to explain that those in power can take away your livelihood, your future, your body. But the one thing they couldn't stop were your own thoughts.

But by having a male professor be the one to uncover and interpret her thoughts, Atwood flips that premise and asks if that is actually true. Because once put down your own thoughts could be misinterpreted or discredited by those who read it.

So while you are squinting at this future world, are you also squinting/ questioning those who are giving you information, too?

The second point is acceptance.

I am glad that you did not like this ending. I am glad that you didn't even like the beginning because you couldn't and wouldn't accept it. NOR SHOULD YOU. Atwood is screaming in the pages about how awful it is to just accept. "Ordinary, said Aunt Lydia, is what you are used to. This may not seem ordinary to you now, but after a time it will. It will become ordinary or It has taken so little time to change our minds, about things like this..."

The sad thing is that Atwood reveals that is exactly what happened. The professor reports that the tale was part of the EARLY GILEAD PERIOD and then goes on to say that there was a middle ----and one could only assume a late period as well.

Gilead society, save for Mayday and a few other resistance leaders, was successful in eradicating all free thinkers. Those in power removed the wild women, those who looked different, those who prayed differently. And it did so in a way that allowed it's own people to become the jailers. Setting up petty issues and classes between the wives and the handmaids and the Marthas. The differences between Guardians, Commanders, and Angels.

There was so much infighting that society continued for at least three periods before it could come to the professor's talk.

So yeah, she didn't explain exactly what happened. She hinted at it. But I think she did so to make you question instead of blindly accepting

Kathy wrote: "I was extremely annoyed by the ending. I hate when story tellers leave it up to the reader to decide what happens. I just think it's spineless."

I kind of agree with you - it depends on the story, but most of the time I prefer a closed ending where there is place for interpretation. However, I have to say that as some reader suggested "Without hope, there is no life", so in some way it is nice to be able to imagine that Offred escaped and made it out of Gilead.

Ana wrote: "Also is it just me or did the epilogue feel a little...disturbing, too? Perhaps it was just the general feeling after having read such a charged book, but it still felt somewhat creepy to me."

Completely agreed - it made me feel uneasy too! Although I can't quite put my finger on the reason(s) why...

This is what Atwood said about the ending in a Guardian article:
"I was perhaps too optimistic to end the Handmaid's story with an outright failure. Even Nineteen Eighty-Four, that darkest of literary visions, does not end with a boot stamping on a human face for ever, or with a broken Winston Smith feeling a drunken love for Big Brother, but with an essay about the regime written in the past tense and in standard English. Similarly, I allowed my Handmaid a possible escape, via Maine and Canada; and I also permitted an epilogue, from the perspective of which both the Handmaid and the world she lived in have receded into history. When asked whether The Handmaid's Tale is about to "come true", I remind myself that there are two futures in the book, and that if the first one comes true, the second one may do so also."

Can I just say, that even though I didn't like the ending, I find myself missing Offred now that I'm done the book. I've started a light-hearted book as a break, but I find myself really craving something "meaty" like "The Handmaid's Tail."

For me the book was shocking, thinking about many issues that happening world wide relating to women rights.
First of all, is the reproductive rights and rental wombs. Nowadays, natality rates are descendig, women decided to be late mothers... In societies like latin america where the main religion is catholic there is still this thinking that women MUST be mothers, ether way, abortion is a taboo, even there is no complete acceptance of LGBTQ comunitiy.
Thinking about the epilogue, we must take into account that history is mostly told by men and winners, so we have to have caution with this dichotomy of history. were there are de good and bad ones. Think about the relevant women that take action in your countries history, and you may see that contribution of women is underestimated. I think that is what the epilogue reflects, that is time for women to write their own history, in fair proportion, not to see men in power as a enemy.
Maybe "Offred" became part of the resistance, but we can't tell the end of the Mayday; if they were fighted, the Gilead regime could have eliminate they registres, as happened with a lot of political disapearences.
What keeps thrilling me is who were the "sons of jacob"? Does she refers to those kinds bared by handmaids?

The optimist in me felt incredibly hopeful at the end of the story. Hopeful that humanity was able to recover from a period as dark as the Gilead regime.

Yes there are many unknowns left at the end of the book (and even more so with the Historical Notes) but I enjoy a book that causes you to pause and think beyond the world within its pages.

Eva wrote: "The optimist in me felt incredibly hopeful at the end of the story. Hopeful that humanity was able to recover from a period as dark as the Gilead regime.

Yes there are many unknowns left at the en..."

I agree with what you said. After reading the epilogue, I got the sense that Offred made it out and settled into a quiet life. I definitely feel, after reading the book, that she was the type of person who did not want the attention that making her story public would have brought. She made the tapes and figured that was enough. Especially if she was indeed pregnant with Nick's baby, she most likely figured that she needed to live a quiet, safe life with the child she had in order to protect them both. To me, that is the more likely scenario.

As to other's points about the professor from the epilogue being male, it was a female professor who introduced him, so women seem to have regained some power, even if it was a man who spoke for most of the epilogue. I never really got the sense that something was off about him, though maybe if I go back and reread it, that may change. Overall, it left me with a sense of hope that even in the bleakest of circumstances, there can be hope even in the smallest of ways (I.e the mentioned Underground Femaleroad and Mayday). Even if they were small movements and their rescue attempts did not always succeed, the women of Gilead at least had some form of hope that people were trying to help.

the beauty and genius of Atwood are evident in the ending. Wether you love it or hate it; it is still being talked about! The themes were relevant long ago and sadly they still are today maybe with different groups but sadly still relevant.

Lou wrote: "For me the book was shocking, thinking about many issues that happening world wide relating to ..."

I find that choice of name - the Sons of Jacob - interesting. I'm fairly sure it's a reference to the Biblical story of the two sons of Jacob who looted and massacred the men of Shechem by themselves. Two guys taking out a city. Choosing to be called that is a pretty strong statement of their intentions. First, that there's going to be violence; second, that power will stay in the hands of a few people only; and third, that they will justify their actions with carefully chosen Biblical passages (the most significant one to the Handmaids being the one about Bilhah bearing Jacob's children as Rachel's proxy).

Erin wrote: "I agree with what you said. After reading the epilogue..."

If I remember correctly, the female professor wasn't just someone introducing the (male) keynote speaker- she was running the entire conference on Gileadean studies. So I think legally at the time of the epilogue, men and women had equal rights, but the fact that it's a man speaking as an expert about the authenticity of a historical source written by a woman seems kind of pointed. It may not be meant to make a statement, since technically Atwood's original premise was more about totalitarianism than feminism, but given the strong theme of gender inequality, specifically women's rights, it does seem significant, as if men are still subconsciously given somewhat more serious attention than women.

Angela wrote: "So I totally took for granted that it told us that the driver was both the eye and the mayday rescuer... and that Offred made it to Maine through Mayday, but didn't make it out of the country hence..."
I agree with you completelly, I find it strange that she would be able to record her story but leave out the part where she tells if and how she got rescued.
This made me believe that she was rescued from the commanders home and from her role as a handmaid, but maybe ended up in another kind of captivity. Where she was allowed to tell her story, but not reveal the ones helping her.
If the people rescuing her is trying to bring down the government I can imagine they want as much information from the people in the society as possible, hence why Offred can tell her story.

Winston wrote: "I also had a lot of questions, but then I read the epilogue (the historical notes) and after analyzing that I found some stronger conclusions, including what happened to Offred and how Gilead came ..."

I had the some of the same thoughts on future society that are on spark notes... It seems the white population decreased massively, the developed countries are not the same, and the university being on the Arctic seems a hint on global warming.

Pam wrote: "Oh, so I wrote this somewhere else, but I don't think that was the place to put it. So, apologies, I will add it again.

I wanted to address this because it ---the ending tried to wrap up the stor..."

The professor make some jokes that I don't get very well, it feels like the world gets better and then worse in cycles, but some ideas don't cease to exist completely during the "better" times. If we don't end with these ideas, we may have a new cycle of bad times.

The cyclic nature of modern sociality ties in with Economic theory. Even catastrophic change like climate change and the infantility disease are factored in such events are known as anti-cyclic.

That being said overall social development as been positive we do treat each other better. However the longer we leave the door open for regression the greater the chances of it occurring.

The final fate of the characters at the end is as always with parables open end to invite the reader to answer for themselves what they see for the characters and the message they portrayed.

In this case no matter what happened it happened when they were free and expressed being how they are not was imposed on any of them.

I see the ending positive. Especially the historical notes make me think that she escaped to Canada and could settle for a calm life. She knew how it was before Gilead, therefore it mustn't have been that difficult for her.

But I can also see her joining the resistance, although I see that less likely, (view spoiler)[since she is expecting Nick's child. My guess is that Ofglen II has turned her in, since neither Serena nor the Commander did it. (hide spoiler)]

I really thought she was going to end her life, when she was in her room thinking of possibilities what to do. The one I thought is really interesting is when she said she should kill Serena (that's what she was thinking of, wasn't she? Because she said she would put them both out of their misery.

What really saddens me is that we know that Gilead lasted for at least more than generation, and so I know that even if Offred has joined the resistance, she wasn't able to tear it down, this totally fucked up system of a society. Sorry for language, but this book gave me really troubles.

The Handmaid's Tale is an engaging read, though disquieting; not merely because Offred's story is harrowing in its own right, but also because stories like hers happen. Sexism... subjugation... human trafficking... these are present realities.

What I did not expect was the epilogue wherein The Handmaid's Tale is discussed as a historical document and treated the same way historians treat recovered documents today. I have done my share of historical criticism and exegesis and it was sobering to hear the visceral experience I had just finished reading treated with such casual regard. Atwood poignantly juxtaposed the urgency of Offred's flight with the removed sterility with which her account is treated in such a way that conveys a need to not merely add The Handmaid's Tale to our repertoires of read books. Rather, Atwood moves us to contour our lives in ways that improve the human condition. By our actions, our voices, our purchases, and our attitudes, we either promote human equality or perpetuate the subjugation and enslavement of our neighbors.