Comparative Perspectives (DP IB English A: Language and Literature: HL): Revision Note

• The protagonist Offred must survive under a theocratic regime 

• Offred’s autonomy and identity is erased in a society in which she is defined by her reproductive value

• The protagonist Hamlet finds himself in a politically treacherous court

• He struggles to reconcile his moral values with his desire for revenge 

• Atwood depicts a futuristic surveillance state that controls the population by fear

• The regime’s state-enforced religious doctrine is a tool of oppression 

• Shakespeare reflects 16th-century social hierarchy, class expectations, and rigid gender roles

• According to the Divine Right of Kings, regicide is believed to be a disruption of the natural order

• Women are divided according to reproductive ability

• Females are restricted to domestic roles and their personal identities (such as their names) are removed

• Hamlet's society allows women little agency

• Women were expected to be obedient and submissive

• Status and security are found only in marriage

• Offred’s past identity is erased

• Her new identity is as a possession of Fred and as a reproductive vessel

• She, and the other Handmaids, have no personal freedom

• Hamlet’s grief over his father's death is worsened by doubt

• He is torn between religious values and supernatural forces

• As a prince, he feels obliged to seek revenge

• For self-preservation, Offred must remain passive and obedient

• However, she resists by remembering her past life and engaging in risky relationships 

• Hamlet believes it is his duty to right the wrongs in the politically-corrupt court 

• He plans to expose the treachery and corruption to restore order 

• Offred is a sympathetic protagonist

• As a fertile woman, she is reduced to a vessel for reproduction

• She must strive to maintain a sense of identity under the theocracy of Gilead

• Hamlet hesitates over his part in correcting the injustice in the corrupted political court

• His moral ethics are tested: he is caught between seeking vengeance and his conscience 

• Atwood aims to caution against a society that restricts women’s freedoms, particularly in terms of reproductive rights

• Her novel warns of the dangers of totalitarianism and evangelical fundamentalism 

• Shakespeare critiques restrictive social structures of 16th-century society

• In particular, he explores succession, familial honour, and patriarchy

• He examines moral ambiguities and complex human emotion

• Atwood’s novel was considered cynical yet realistic social commentary

• It has become a key political and feminist text

• Her characterisation of Offred was critiqued as a passive, yet resistant survivor of patriarchal extremes

• The novel was adapted into a television series in 2017

• Hamlet was received as a revenge tragedy and morality play

• Early intеrprеtations of the play considered it in terms of religious and political thеmеs

• Thеmеs of usurpation, regicide, succession, and the moral responsibilities of lеadеrs rеsonatеd with thе political instability of 16th century England 

• Atwood crafts a surreal mood through the subjective first-person narrator, presenting experiences that are blurred with memories 

• Offred’s limited perspective offers readers a fragmented story that highlights her fear and trauma resulting from past events

• The tone shifts between hope and despair, reflecting Offred’s struggle to maintain sanity

• The audience understands character relationships through dialogue

• Dialogue reveals plotting, betrayals, and secrecy, highlighting the ill-ease in court

• Hamlet's soliloquies are particularly effective in depicting his inner turmoil, raising themes of morality and religion

• Atwood sets her novel in Gilead, based in Massachusetts, a real American state in the near-future 

• Domestic settings are functional and minimalist

• She describes an America suffering environmental ruin

• “Colonies” and “Homelands”, in which there are limited resources, are used for segregation and exile

• The play is set in “Elsinore Castle”, a fictional representation of a Danish castle, which raises themes of familial duty and political corruption

• The graveyard, where Hamlet delivers his powerful soliloquy about life and death, emphasises Hamlet's existential crisis

• Atwood uses character’s actions to illustrate tension and paranoia 

• Women fidget, or know they should not fidget 

• They smoke to relieve tension

• Ofglen bows her head, presenting her sad meekness

• Actions and dialogue reveal deceit in the court 

• Hamlet's fatal flaw is revealed via soliloquies

• His inner turmoil leads to inaction and reveal his moral concerns 

• His dialogue with Ophelia, particularly, presents his attitude to women 

• Allusions to the Salem Witch Trials are made by setting Gilead in Massachusetts

• Atwood’s novel emphasises the oppressive theocratic rule in Gilead with allusions to the Christian bible, particularly the Old Testament

• Allusions to Greek mythology are typical of Shakespeare's tragedies

• As a morality play, its characters allude to saints and biblical figures

• Shakespeare raises ideas about religion and the supernatural 

• Colour identifies women according to their marital and reproductive roles and status

• The Handmaids wear red, which may symbolise blood and fertility, as well as the threat they represent

• The “Eye” symbolises constant surveillance, presented as “the eyes of the Lord”

• Poison and skulls are symbolic of death and betrayal

• Metaphors relating to rot symbolise political corruption in the court

• The ghost of Hamlet’s father can be interpreted as symbolic of tensions between supernatural forces and religion

• Offred describes the rigid gender roles in Gilead: “Everything except the wings around my face is red: the colour of blood, which defines us”

• She describes how the oppressive rule erases her identity: “My name isn’t Offred. I have another name, which nobody uses now because it’s forbidden”

• When the ghost of the king appears, Marcellus comments: “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark”

• Hamlet expresses moral ambiguities: “There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so”

• Hamlet reflects on his inaction as a result of moral ethics: “Thus conscience does make cowards of us all”

• Offred finds herself in a theocratic society after the American government is overthrown

• Offred remembers her past life (speculatively, pre-2005)

• Blanche DuBois is forced to leave her aristocratic home “Belle Reve” when her father dies and she loses her fortune

• She must adapt to the multi-cultural, working-class New Orleans

• The novel begins in Gilead, a near-future theocratic world

• Offred’s flashbacks recall a life before the coup in America

• The novel ends with “Historical Notes” written in 2195

• The play begins as Blanche arrives in “Elysian Fields Avenue” in New Orleans

• Most of the action occurs in the cramped Kowalski apartment 

• Blanche recalls her ancestral plantation home in Mississippi, “Belle Reve”

The Handmaid’s Tale

A Streetcar Named Desire

• Gilead is a dystopian, theocratic society

• It is set in Massachusetts, America in the near future

• Atwood describes Gilead as a sterile, surveillance state 

• Former American law has been replaced by patriarchal hierarchy ruled by Old Testament doctrine 

• The play is set in the French Quarter of New Orleans in the 1940s

• The multi-cultural, industrial setting reflects the changing post-World War II society

• It is dictated by patriarchal values and work ethics that pertain to the American Dream

• Williams’s setting draws attention to the decline of the aristocratic Old South

• Atwood’s novel serves as a cautionary tale about the dangers of authoritarian societies

• She critiques the reversal of women's rights and the rise of religious extremism in 1980s America

• Tennessee Williams portrays the decline and decay of traditional Southern aristocracy

• He critiques the post-World War II gender ideals and attitudes to sexuality

• While initial 1980s audiences considered the setting a warning about the future, modern audiences understand it as a worrying description of the 21st century  

• The setting is praised for its description of the impact of environmental destruction and how this can lead to brutal societal control

• The play was an immediate success when it premiered in 1947

• As Williams predicted in 1941, the audience was ready to receive “the living truth” about their new post-war society

• It was quickly adapted into a successful Hollywood film

• Its reflection of a crumbling social order became a global success 

• Atwood’s narrator offers a subjective view of life in a theocracy:

  • Offred describes the street as “almost like a museum, or a street in a model town”

  • She compares her house to a nunnery

• Offred’s narration reflects the fear and mistrust that comes from a repressive and surveillance-based society

• The audience understands characters and their response to the environment through dialogue and stage directions

• Stage directions focus on the multicultural society: “New Orleans is a cosmopolitan city where there is a relatively warm and easy intermingling of races in the old part of town”

• Characters’ idiolects present the clash of cultures between the Old and New South

• Gilead is set in a real place (Cambridge, Massachusetts) in the near future

• A totalitarian theocracy has replaced the American government 

• Flashbacks remind 20th-century readers of a society instantly recognisable, such as a “park” with “ducks” and a "parking lot”

• The play is set in the vibrant, multicultural, industrial French Quarter of New Orleans in the 1940s

• Blanche’s previous home “Belle Reve” is symbolic of the romantic and aristocratic Old South

• Her move to the small apartment on “Elysian Fields Avenue”, where her sister and Stanley live, is symbolic of her need to adapt to a new society

• Atwood describes Offred through actions and inner monologue

• Her desire for self-preservation is conveyed by her narration: “I try not to think too much”

• Her resistance is portrayed in games of Scrabble with the Commander or when she steals a daffodil

• Blanche’s criticism of her sister’s apartment conveys her aristocratic heritage

• She spends a lot of time in the bathroom to find some privacy

• Stella is often in the kitchen

• When Stanley plays poker, Williams reflects his character via “lurid nocturnal” lights and primary colours to present his bold confidence   

• Shops in Gilead are named after biblical phrases that reflect the theocracy: "Loaves and Fishes" and "Daily Bread"

• The setting alludes to the Salem Witch Trials in Massachusetts to reflect the oppressive control of women

• Allusions to Greek mythology (such as “Elysian Fields”) represent Blanche’s journey to her doomed fate

•  Blanche criticises the dingy apartment with an allusion to a gothic writer: “Only Poe! Only Mr. Edgar Allan Poe!—could do it justice! Out there I suppose is the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir!"

• To depict a society under constant surveillance, Atwood uses the symbolic representation of eyes

• Gardens represent both the idea of fertility and represent restricted domestic settings for women 

• Mirrors symbolise erased female sexuality and restricted identity: “mirrors have been replaced here too by oblongs of dull grey metal” or they are like the “eye of a fish”

• The contrasting musical  motifs of Blues music and Blanche’s “Varsouviana Polka” symbolise a clash of cultures in New Orleans

• Shadows and “lurid reflections” on the walls represent Blanche’s turmoil

• The sky in stage directions is “tender blue”, symbolising an “atmosphere of decay” 

• Atwood depicts a realistic setting for her oppressive regime, Gilead: the Handmaids take “walks, twice daily, two by two around the football field which was enclosed now by a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire”

• Offred recalls her past life with sensory detail: “I once had a garden. I can remember the smell of the turned earth”

• Williams describes a realistic New Orleans in stage directions: “The section is poor but unlike corresponding sections in other American cities, it has a raffish charm”

• He uses sensory imagery to bring the multicultural setting to life: “the warm breath of the brown river beyond the river warehouses with their faint redolences of bananas and coffee”

The conflict between the individual and their environment

1984

Both protagonists struggle in oppressive, dystopian societies 

Atwood feminises the dystopian genre, while Orwell presents his dystopia from a male perspective 

Atwood describes a society overthrown by oppressive forces 

Things Fall Apart

Both writers present changes societies that are controlled by powerful governments 

While Achebe describes Nigeria’s colonial history, Atwood depicts a futuristic society

Atwood’s setting descriptions reflect the functional and restrictive nature of the environment 

The Great Gatsby

Both writers use setting to offer social commentary

Atwood uses simple descriptions to describe a dystopian society while Fitzgerald uses rich, sensory imagery to describe 1920s elitist America

Atwood’s protagonist has been praised as a sympathetic yet powerful victim

Othello 

Both writers have been praised for their sympathetic, marginalised protagonists

While Atwood’s protagonist is passive, Shakespeare’s protagonist is moved to violent action