All language subtitles for Masterclass Margaret Atwood Teaches Creative Writing - 19.Speculative Fiction Case Study The Handmaid’s Tale

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MARGARET ATWOOD:
"The Handmaid's Tale"

is about a future society that
has replaced the United States,

as we know it today.

And it's called Gilead.

And we follow the fortunes of
one of the inhabitants of it.

It's a society that has
regulated people into castes.

It's a society that has
regulated people into castes.

They are identified by the kind
of clothing that they wear.

And certain women, who
have the now rare ability

to have children,
are called handmaids.

So the handmaids are
allocated to the top people

in the society and
their wives, in order

to act as surrogate
mothers for them.

to act as surrogate
mothers for them.

The wives then get the children.

And the handmaid has to move on.

So that is their function.

And we follow the story
of one of these women.

And that is straight
out of the Bible,

because in name it is a biblical
kind of totalitarianism.

And in the Bible, we
have Rachel and Leah.

And then we have a baby
contest between them.

And then we have a baby
contest between them.

And in order to
have more babies,

they enlist their
handmaids and have babies

by the handmaids,
which they themselves

get to name and to keep.

So that's the model for it,
much as under Hitler there

were these biological wives.

So if you were an
SS man, you could

have more than one woman,
to produce more little SS

have more than one woman,
to produce more little SS

children.

At that time I was
living in West Berlin.

The wall around West
Berlin was still in place.

And therefore, I was seeing
all of this in action.

What kicked it off
was a conversation

I was having with
a friend of mine.

And what we were talking
about was the idea

that some people were
already having then,

that women should go
back into the home.

So if women should go
back into the home,

So if women should go
back into the home,

how are you going
to get them there?

So that was a
problem to be solved.

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"The Handmaid's Tale" came from
three different, let us say,

bodies of knowledge.

The 17th century
Puritans, who had

their stronghold in
Cambridge, Massachusetts,

their stronghold in
Cambridge, Massachusetts,

where this novel is set.

Harvard started as a
theological seminary.

And the 17th century
Puritans were not Democrats.

This was not a
democratic society.

It was a theocracy.

And they had some pretty
interesting rules.

For instance,
pointing and laughing

were quite frowned upon.

And so were Quakers.

They were not fond of Quakers.

They were not fond of Quakers.

They hanged some of them.

So I had studied this
because I had to.

I had to fill my gap.

And I was lucky enough to have
a man called Perry Miller, who

originated the study
of American Puritans

in American universities and
was still teaching at that time.

So these were also
some of my ancestors.

They were in those
Quaker-hanging Puritans.

So I was pretty
interested in them.

So I was pretty
interested in them.

That was one.

Number two was my study
of utopias and dystopias

as literary forms.

So I was one of
those teenagers who

was reading "Brave New World."

I was reading "1984," about the
time it was first published.

First edition, paperback,
I still have it.

Those sorts of books, Ray
Bradbury, John Wyndham,

Those sorts of books, Ray
Bradbury, John Wyndham,

I was mainlining
those as a teenager.

And I had always pretty
much wanted to write one.

But most of them were from
the point of view of men.

So I thought it would
be interesting to take

one of those dystopic
societies and flip it, and see

what that felt like from the
point of view of a woman in it.

Another question was,
if the United States

Another question was,
if the United States

were going to have
a totalitarianism--

because totalitarianisms are
the third body of knowledge.

Having been born in 1939, I
was quite familiar with them,

having lived through
parts of some of them.

If the United States were
to have a totalitarianism,

what kind of
totalitarianism would it be?

It would not be,
Hi, my name is Bob.

I'm a communist.

And I'm now going to be
your fearless leader.

And I'm now going to be
your fearless leader.

That's unlikely ever to happen.

So if it wasn't going to
be that, what would it be?

I thought it most
likely that it would

be some form of
fundamentalist theocracy.

And we were seeing
already in the 1980s,

the resurgence of that kind of
thinking in the United States.

Let us not forget that
had the United States not

Let us not forget that
had the United States not

entered World War II,
with Pearl Harbor,

they might have ended
up with somebody

like Charles Lindbergh
for president,

a fascist sympathizer.

So this was not really
that far off the possible.

And at the time, I was writing.

Although it was the '80s and
the civil rights movement

Although it was the '80s and
the civil rights movement

had happened, we
were by no means

in a situation in which
everybody in the country

was viewed as equal,
as having equal rights.

And we are still not.

So all of that thinking fed in.

The rule that I
made for the book

was that nothing
went into it that

had not happened in real
life, somewhere, at some time.

had not happened in real
life, somewhere, at some time.

And that's why I collected
all of the research.

And the reason I made that rule
is that I didn't want anybody

saying, you certainly have
a twisted, weird, evil

imagination.

You made up all
these bad things.

I didn't make them up.

So that is one of the
functions of research

in a novel like this.

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Let us look at some
of the research.

These are all from the mid-80s.

"Charges of brain-washing.

Catholics say cult taking over."

So this is the disciples of an
1,100-member religious sect are

practicing brainwashing.

And they subordinate women.

They discourage social
contact with nonmembers.

They discourage social
contact with nonmembers.

They arrange marriages.

And they move
teenage disciples to,

quote, "households
for indoctrination."

I didn't make it up.

All right.

Here we go.

That was a Catholic sect.

But there have been a
number of different sorts

of cults of this kind.

Their treatment of
women is very Islamic,

somebody said in the mid-80s.

Brainwashing, People
of Hope, et cetera.

Brainwashing, People
of Hope, et cetera.

So they weren't actually forcing
people to join this cult.

But the wives of the
coordinators are called,

quotes, "handmaidens."

As I say, I didn't make it up.

But that's straight out
of the Bible, anyway.

Again, a lot of research
on Mormons, for instance.

And on American slavery,
who was allowed to read,

who was not allowed to read,
the Underground Railroad.

who was not allowed to read,
the Underground Railroad.

The "Handmaid's Tale" has
a similar escape route.

Going through the
research materials,

you will come across efforts
to control reproduction one

way or another, either to
make people have more babies

or to make people
have fewer babies.

Totalitarian regimes
are big on that

because they want planned
societies, like really planned.

because they want planned
societies, like really planned.

And sometimes those go
spectacularly off the rails.

So Ceausescu, in Romania,
mandated that women

should have four children.

He gave them pregnancy
tests every month.

And if they weren't pregnant,
they had to say why.

And, of course,
what that meant was

that people were having
children that they

couldn't afford to support.

And they were putting
them in orphanages.

And that created really a
pretty bad situation in Romania.

And that created really a
pretty bad situation in Romania.

But that's in the "Handmaid's
Tale" historical notes.

I reference a lot of
those things in the notes.

So the cults-- the
credit cards, how you

would cut people's money off.

So if you wanted to get
women back into the home,

you would have to reverse
the financial progress

that they made over the
past, say, 150 years.

So they moved from
a point where they

couldn't control their
own money or have

couldn't control their
own money or have

really any kinds of jobs
that were not servant jobs.

They moved out of that
position, into the 20th century

and the 21st century, in
which they gain the right

to control their own
finances, have their own bank

accounts, own houses,
that kind of thing.

So how would you get
them back into the home?

You'd have to
immediately cut that off.

Cut off the access to money.

Cut off the access to money.

And the credit
card, unfortunately,

allows you to do that, should
you wish to, very quickly.

In fact, any form of
electronic sorting and tagging

allows you to do
that kind of control

in a way that wouldn't
have been possible before.

So here comes the credit card.

And I would suggest that you
not get rid of cash money.

And I would suggest that you
not get rid of cash money.

Cash money is actually more
fluid than credit card money.

And it's much harder to
control your access to it.

So cash can be a
security problem.

Checks can bounce, et cetera,
et cetera, all this rationale.

This is January, 1984.

People were already thinking
of getting rid of cash money.

Don't do it.

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I sometimes do draw little
sketches of things in my books.

"The Handmaid's Tale" is
very dependent on clothing

and what people are
wearing because,

like medieval
societies, it's very

specific who is wearing what.

So the costume is apparently
inspired by nuns, of course.

But also by the old Dutch
Cleanser package of the 1940s,

But also by the old Dutch
Cleanser package of the 1940s,

which showed this pretty
sinister looking woman

holding a great big stick.

And she was supposed
to be chasing the dirt.

But she had a bonnet
that was hiding her face.

So I think I imprinted on
that as a innocent child.

It was quite a
mysterious figure.

I did the costumes as
red because, of course,

I did the costumes as
red because, of course,

it's a iconic color.

So none of these ideas
are particularly new.

And they weren't new--

they weren't new then.

So the eye is a sort of logo,
particularly for the Secret

Service.

And sometimes, of course,
it's got wings on it.

The Secret Service people in
the regime are called the Eyes.

The Secret Service people in
the regime are called the Eyes.

They're the people who do
all the unpleasant spy work.

The eye is off the American
money, basically a Masonic eye,

off the Great Seal.

But it is also the
eye of God, that

rolls around over all of the
world, seeing everything.

The thing about
totalitarianisms is that they're

very big on logos and designs.

And this totalitarianism
is no different.

And this totalitarianism
is no different.

If only Hitler had been
accepted at art school,

world history would
have been different

because he was happiest when
designing costumes and stage

sets.

That's what he really
liked about his regime.

There's a movie
about that called

"The Architecture
of Doom," which

goes into his
architectural interests.

You can see why he wasn't
accepted at art school

because although he
could draw buildings,

because although he
could draw buildings,

he couldn't do people,
really hardly at all.

What does that tell you?