After reading the first three chapters and the epigraph of The Handmaid’s Tale, I’m left with more questions than I had when I was first beginning the novel. The first epigraph is taken from the bible, and I believe that the Rachel mentioned in the excerpt is an allusion to women in the society of Atwood’s book. Rachel claims that if she can’t give birth then she will die, which leads me to believe Atwood plays upon that sexist line of thought that women are only good for procreation. Bilhah reminds me of the protagonist of the novel, whom I don’t believe has been named yet, in the sense that she is the maid brought to a couple in order to serve them by giving them a baby.

 

The second epigraph is from Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal”, which if I remember correctly is Swift suggesting that the impoverished Irish can better themselves by selling their children as food to rich people. I think that this ties into The Handmaid’s Tale because it seems as if the protagonist is a part of a social class of young women that are “sold” to older couples in order to help them get pregnant. The protagonist’s purpose, in this society’s eyes, is to give birth to keep the human race going, as for some reason it seems like older women either do not want to or cannot “fulfill their duties”, so to speak.

 

The third epigraph is a little more vague to me, and I’m not completely sure how it could tie into the novel. Perhaps it is a reference to unwritten rules in the society of both the novel and our own?