“Whatever is silenced will clamour to be heard, though silently” The oxymoron in the quote from The Handmaid’s Tale, a science fiction or sci-fi, by Margaret Atwood can be read as a comment on the contradiction the novel itself embodies. The Handmaid’s Tale is a dystopian novel set in the future New England where the Republic of Gilead, a totalitarian state, has overpowered the United States of America. The book is about the women assigned to an elite couple who cannot reproduce to help them bear children. The women become their handmaids with whom the elite men have sexual intercourse and hence conceive their heir. Published in 1985, the novel portrays a world which is chronologically years ahead of the present but ideologically routing back to the dreading conventions of history. The contradiction in the novel is the portrayal of a future in the present and a future that is a bloodbath of the silenced and unrepaired past. It underlines two ideas, the “clamour” of the past characterised with totalitarianism and overt patriarchy echoing the future, and the imminent future precipitated with the strife of the present, conversing with the present through the ‘silent’ pages of a novel.
The sci-fi like The Handmaid’s Tale, has the unique characteristic of reflecting the future as a result of the conditions of past and present. The future depicted is usually a dystopian world; a dark world degraded by surfeit, and hence strongly criticises certain conventions and practices of past and present. Moya Bailey, an assistant professor at Northeastern University, teaching a new course on science fiction and feminism to the undergraduates says,
“What I see in The Handmaid’s Tale and other science fiction stories is a cautionary tale and an opportunity for us to think through how we might intervene in the world as it is to create something new for ourselves,”
Another example of such transitional sci-fi is Frankenstein or The Modern Prometheus written by Mary Shelly, published in 1818. It is a story of a scientist, Victor Frankenstein, who becomes so obsessed with science, experimentation, and its ideas of defining everything, that he creates a hideous creature assembling parts of different dead bodies. The horrific description of the “monster” and how it ruins Victor’s life totally, is a comment on the surfeit of science to reduce everything into reason and definitions, to the extent of negating the natural processes of death and birth. Written in the period marked with conflict of reason and emotion, the novel seems to say that science has its limitations and it cannot meddle with the natural processes of death and life, which is a priori and unchangeable. In a very refined interpretation, Frankenstein is an example of the saying “excess of anything is bad”.
Similarly, Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale reflects a future where the democratic republic of the US has been transformed into a republic, a totalitarian state with no democracy. The Republic of Gilead in the book assassinates the President of the US and rises to power. The age depicted in the book is a world of readily available pornography, prostitution, and patriarchal violence on women, which warns the consequence of unchecked patriarchy in the past and the present. Besides, the book also shows the reduced rates of reproduction due to ‘excess’ chemical pollution which led to the exploitation of women as handmaids. There are still many instances in which Atwood shows a relation between the present and the consequent dystopian future that would be the reality unless the present is stirred into action to avoid the impending danger. The ending of the novel makes it unique and one of its kind. In the end, the novels shifts to further future when the Republic of Gilead has become past, and a new world emerges which is a “more feminist and just world”, according to Bailey.
Encouraging the readership and study of science fictions can be a substantial step towards rethinking the present and desiring the correct future. Hence, according to Moya Bailey,
“If students can imagine a way around some of the problems in our current time, they can actually see solutions…That’s what the best sci-fi offers us: The opportunity to change the course of the future.”
Rudrani Kumari