The Handmaid's Tale Paperback - 1998
by Margaret Atwood
First published in 1985, this is a novel of such power that the reader is unable to forget its images and its forecast. It is at once scathing satire, dire warning, and tour de force. "A novel that brilliantly illuminates some of the darker interconnections between politics and sex".--"The Washington Post Book World".
About this book
The Handmaid's Tale was nominated for the first-ever Man Booker International Prize representing the best writers in contemporary fiction.
Margaret Atwood is the author of more than 35 internationally acclaimed works of fiction, poetry, and critical essays. Her numerous awards include the Governor General’s Award for The Handmaid’s Tale, and The Giller Prize and Italian Premio Mondello for Alias Grace. The Handmaid’s Tale, Cat’s Eye, Alias Grace, and Oryx and Crake were all shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, which she won with The Blind Assassin. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and has been awarded the Norwegian Order of Literary Merit and the French Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres among many others; she is a Foreign Honorary Member for Literature of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She lives in Toronto.
Summary
From the jacket flap
In the world of the near future, who will control women's bodies?
Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. She may leave the home of the Commander and his wife once a day to walk to food markets whose signs are now pictures instead of words because women are no longer allowed to read. She must lie on her back once a month and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, because in an age of declining births, Offred and the other Handmaids are only valued if their ovaries are viable.
Offred can remember the days before, when she lived and made love with her husband Luke; when she played with and protected her daughter; when she had a job, money of her own, and access to knowledge. But all of that is gone now....
Funny, unexpected, horrifying, and altogether convincing, "The Handmaid's Tale is at once scathing satire, dire warning, and tour de force.
First Edition Identification
McClelland and Stewart published a 1st edition of The Handmaid’s Tale in 1985, as a hardcover in Toronto, Canada. A true first printing includes "Set in the near future in a locale resembling Cambridge Massachusetts, this work describes life in what was once the United States - A Clockwork Orange, as seen by women" on the dust jacket.
In 1986 Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, published the first US edition of The Handmaid’s Tale in 1986.
Jonathan Cape published the first UK edition of The Handmaid’s Tale in 1986.
Details
- Title The Handmaid's Tale
- Author Margaret Atwood
- Binding Paperback
- Edition [ Edition: Repri
- Pages 336
- Volumes 1
- Language ENG
- Publisher Anchor Books, New York, NY
- Date 1998-03-16
- Features Table of Contents
- ISBN 9780385490818 / 038549081X
- Weight 0.55 lbs (0.25 kg)
- Dimensions 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.8 in (20.07 x 12.95 x 2.03 cm)
- Ages 14 to 18 years
- Grade levels 9 - 13
- Reading level 750
-
Themes
- Catalog Heading: Language Arts/Literature
- Curriculum Strand: Language Arts/Literature
- Library of Congress subjects Fantasy fiction, Women
- Library of Congress Catalog Number 97042966
- Dewey Decimal Code FIC
Media reviews
Citations
- Booklist, 01/01/2001, Page 976
- Entertainment Weekly, 06/27/2008, Page 98
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