These are so completely not the right questions to ask! But part of me just has a really driving urge to ask whether a novel’s setting is workable, from an engineering standpoint.
So Handmaid’s Tale. My reference is the series rather than the book (only up to episode 3 so far–spoilers are okay with me), though insights from the book are welcome. I’m wondering things like, where do new Marthas and Handmaids come from? (I am supposing every Martha or Handmaid becomes part of the Aunts’ ranks–whether the Handmaid-facing front we see in the series or doing work behind the scenes organizing the Handmaids–once they reach a certain age or something.) What’s the actual birthrate? When a child is born, how is it determined what class/caste it will belong to? If all children of wives remain in that class, how are people in other classes being born? Do the male servants of the commanders get to reproduce too? Are their kids the marthas and handmaids? And, what we see in the series appears to be life in a particularly well controlled area, inhabited only by very upper class people and their servants. What are things like in more densely populated areas? Same class system? Is it messier?
What is known about things like this, if anything? What speculations might we fairly engage in?
I think its described in novels and other sources (I rely on the wikias, because I don’t really care for the story*) the Handmaidens are any woman, who are verifiably fertile or at least not yet proven to be infertile, who have committed any crime. I got the impression the status quo is designed to punish anyone at random for anything. So whistling on Sunday, rolling your eyes at a party chairman, possibly not being perfectly heterosexual, and bam, your case comes up next Tuesday. Wives get to become wives in part because of their connections. But if they mouth off, or just get a man pissed off enough at them, they can become convicts, and likewise for troublemaker teens. Wasn’t our handmaiden caught trying to escape the country with her then husband?
*Listen. I very much enjoyed Cat’s Eye, and I think I really understand Margret Atwood’s literary direction. I just think The Handmaid’s Tale is contrived and too far-fetched a story for me to suspend disbelief. I feel like, from the spoilers I’ve read, that Handmaid’s really ends up in the same place as Cat’s Eye, and Cat’s Eye just gets there in a more subtle and cerebral way.
Leaving aside the placement of sewers: the story depicts Gilead as a territory carved out of the former USA, still fighting wars against the other territories. So I’d guess that the ranks of the servant class (Marthas, Angels, Handmaids, etc.) may be refreshed by the capture of ‘enemy’ personnel who are offered the choice to serve, or to die.
I have not seen the series, but the Wikipedia entry on the book describes the caste system in some detail. I’ll address some of your more specific questions below based on my memory of the book.
First of all, it’s important to note that in both the book and (from what I hear) the series, the Republic of Gilead has only been around for a few years. Finding “new” Marthas doesn’t seem to be a problem, as there are presumably plenty of adult women around with domestic skills and no other employment opportunities.
Handmaids are women who are believed to be fertile and are guilty of “gender crimes” under the new regime. They’re basically sentenced to become Handmaids, with the alternative being to join the infertile criminals in doing hard labor in dangerously polluted areas – essentially a death sentence. Any Handmaid who fails to produce a child after six years is sent off to work with the other criminals. Over time the laws change so things that were previously acceptable become gender crimes, thus producing a supply of new Handmaids.
Aunts aren’t just any older woman, it’s a job, sort of like being a prison matron. Being a Martha is a different job, and Marthas can presumably keep on being Marthas for many years. A lot of Handmaids end up dead while still young, and since they’re all “gender criminals” to begin with I don’t think they’d generally be considered good candidates for Aunts.
I don’t remember if the actual birthrate is ever specified, but it’s low. Many children are also born with severe birth defects. The healthy children of Handmaids are considered the legitimate children of the couple the Handmaid is serving. Any children a Handmaid might already have are taken from her and adopted by elite couples.
There’s not a lot about them in the book, but the wives of men who aren’t in the elite upper class are called “Econowives”. These families don’t have Marthas or Handmaids to serve them. If a lower class couple is fertile then they’re presumably going to have kids, as birth control and abortion are illegal.
To be honest, the entire thing is so poorly thought out and unworkable that the way Atwood set up the Gileadan society is her best proof for her argument that THT isn’t science fiction. The society is in a population collapse and the solution is to give every woman 3 sex acts to bear a child (in the book. Apparently in the TV show, they get 6 years, which makes more sense) with these sex acts being with a geriatric partner or some other old fart? And if she doesn’t, “Off to the mines with you!”?
Atwood openly admits this. THT isn’t sci-fi, its a political parable. The Republic of Gilead has set up a stupid system that can’t be justified scientifically by the remaining scientists, yet they dare not go against the Religious order. In fact, the Republic of Gilead claims they were just bringing order to a devastated system, and were going to turn power back to the people. And then they don’t, duh. Except, in the book’s epilogue, it seems that the Republic of Gilead does get overthrown. So, win for everybody, I guess?
But we’ve had lengthier discussions on this board regarding the plausibility of THT. No reason for me to start spouting a day late and a dollar short. But I do urge budding feminists, or any thinking person really, to skip reading THT and go for Cat’s Eye. I mean, Cat’s Eye, it really made me not just think, but really feel stuff. Like four decades worth of social turmoil.
That’s not what happens in the book. Handmaids get IIRC up to three two-year postings which involve regular sex with the man they’ve been assigned to. Offred is on her second posting at the time of the story.
Oh, and it’s not every woman who has a deadline to produce a child, it’s only Handmaids. I have not seen the series, but the wife at Offred’s current posting is a pretty important character in the book and obviously had not been sent away for being infertile.
I haven’t seen all the episodes of the series, but in the book, there is the implication that there are those willing to help the Handmaids avoid this gruesome fate. It’s not entirely altruistic, as they do get something out of it for themselves, but both Nick and Offred’s attending physician have the opportunity to secretly impregnate her (assuming that they aren’t both sterile, which could very well be), and surely The Commander and his wife would be delighted to welcome the resulting child - or at least put on a show of being delighted.
