MASARYK UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF EDUCATION Department of English Language and Literature Intertextuality of Women’s Roles in The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood Diploma Thesis Brno 2019 Supervisor: Author: Mgr. Lucie Podroužková, Ph. D. Bc. Iveta Smejkalová Bibliografický záznam Smejkalová, Iveta. Intertextuality of women roles in The Handmaid´s Tale by Margaret Atwood. Brno: Masarykova univerzita, Fakulta pedagogická, Katedra anglického jazyka a literatury, 2019. Vedoucí diplomové práce Lucie Podroužková. Abstract This thesis addresses the intertextuality of women’s roles in Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale. The first section focuses on the context of Atwood’s work. The next section discusses intertextuality and its classification in literary theory. The main section analyzes intertextuality by examining women’s roles and their archetypes within The Handmaid’s Tale. The final section compares two of Atwood’s works, The Handmaid’s Tale and The Penelopiad, and their intertextual connections in relation to women’s roles. Key Words Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid´s Tale, intertextuality, archetext, archetype I hereby declare that I have worked on this thesis independently and that I have used only the sources listed in the bibliography section. Brno, 30th November 2019 …………………………….... Bc. Iveta Smejkalová Acknowledgement I would sincerely like to express my gratitude to my thesis supervisor, Mgr. Lucie Podroužková, Ph. D. for her continuous support, valuable advice, patience and encouragement during the writing process. Many thanks also belong to my family, partner and close friends for their continuous support throughout my studies and patience. Table of Contents 1.Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 5 1.1 The Handmaid’s Tale in the Context of Margaret Atwood’s Work..................................... 7 1.2 A Brief Summary and Reflection of Margaret Atwood’s Work ....................................... 12 2. Intertextuality in Literary Theory ........................................................................................... 16 2.1 Archetypes and Archetexts ............................................................................................... 16 2.2 Types of Intertextuality in Literary Theory ...................................................................... 16 2.3 Roles of Women in Literary and Cultural Intertextuality ................................................. 23 2.4 Summary and Hypothesis ................................................................................................. 25 2.5 Further Hypotheses ........................................................................................................... 26 3.0 Women’s Roles and Their Contextual Functions in The Handmaid’s Tale ........................... 28 3.1 About Women’s Roles and Intertextuality in General ...................................................... 28 3.2 Acknowledged Intertextuality ........................................................................................... 29 3.3 Comparison of Formal Features of Intertext with Jonathan Swift’s Work ....................... 38 3.4 The Motif of Survival and Women’s Roles ...................................................................... 41 4. Women’s Roles in Comparison ............................................................................................... 46 5. Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 51 6. Works cited ............................................................................................................................. 55 Primary source ........................................................................................................................ 55 Secondary sources .................................................................................................................. 55 Introduction This diploma thesis addresses Margaret Atwood’s novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, focusing on its female characters and its use of intertextuality. Atwood, a Canadian author, is also a poet and literary critic. I first watched a serial adaption of this novel before reading it and other books by the author. Margaret Atwood began writing her first novel The Edible Woman in 1969. One of the main themes in her books is how political subjugation often determines a women’s fate. Atwood belongs to feminist and social activists’ organizations. Because of her concerns about women’s rights, she emphasizes feminist motifs in her writings. As a literary critic and theorist, she deals with semantic structures of text. One structure that overlaps from literary science to creative literature is intertextuality, the shaping of one text’s meaning by another. This interconnection occurs with frequency in her books. Intertextuality should not only be analytical, but it should also address ideologies, such as women’s roles in society, as reflected in the writings to which the author refers. Some primary texts or archetypes occur more often than others, so examining Atwood’s novels will be of help. The thesis addresses the following research questions: ● What are the archetypes to which the author most often refers? ● What are the different female roles within the narrative? ● How do those roles influence the story? It is my goal to find answers to these questions. The thesis’ structure is as follows, with the first section describing the story, The Handmaid’s Tale, in context. The second focuses on theory, emphasizing the general function and definition of intertextuality. I base both section on literature, including books by literary theorists such as Mikhail Bakhtin, Jean-Francois Lyotard, Henrik Markiewicz, Robert Miola. In this thesis I will examine various types of intertextuality. The third section represents the core of the thesis, with an analytical examination of intertextuality in The Handmaid’s Tale, emphasizing women’s roles as heroines. I will point out the original literature Atwood used to model her characters’ speech, actions and 5 characteristics. The fourth section’s topic is a comparison of women’s roles in the novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, to those performed by female characters in other Atwood novels. The final section focuses on the thesis’ conclusion. I consider female roles an interesting research topic. It allowed me to better understand the differences and similarities between women characters of the past and those in contemporary novels. 6 1.1 The Handmaid’s Tale in the Context of Margaret Atwood’s Work To classify Margaret Atwood, a priori, as a feminist author, would not be sufficient. She has made substantial progress as a writer. The specific criteria characterizing her work since the end of the 1980s does not apply to her earlier works. However, what typifies her writings from the start of her career is her skill in using strong women as main characters. It is possible to identify her heroines from ancient mythology, a topic discussed later in this thesis. A thesis by Simone de Beauvoir, one of the leading representatives of feminist literature, forms a theoretical basis for Margaret Atwood’s work. Beauvoir’s writings serve as a model for female authors who wish to create strong heroines. She claims that male authors embody the hunting instinct for killing. Those authors encode that instinct in their characters’ transcendentalist manners. In contrast, female authors possess immanent intuition. Women are guardians and donors of life. Since what is pervasive remains, women have motherhood coded within them. (Beauvoir 14) From Beauvoir’s thesis, it is possible to anticipate Margaret Atwood’s themes and motifs. For example, when a mother violates rules, inner conflict and disharmony become the main reason for her actions. Within this motif, Atwood embeds the concept of survival, a key feature in Canadian literature. Then, she intensifies the problems by adding a victim, the most compelling character motivator. As Atwood stresses the motifs of survival and victimization, they become integral parts of the unfulfilled or broken identity of the female heroine, as seen in her prose and early poetic texts. Not all of Atwood’s literary contributions follow this organizational structure. This thesis will focus on writings that have strong intertextual connections. Her literature that deviates from this model includes Two-Headed Poems written in 1978, and Journals of Susanna Moodie, composed in 1970. Still, the major themes of Canadian identity and the struggle of Canadian people with nature are typical of Atwood’s writings in the 1970s. Atwood’s career began in 1961, with the poetry collection, Double Persephone. Although published in a small run, it is available in electronic form. (Atwood 1961) If one reads this heraldic poem, several motifs become clear. Its title refers to the Greek goddess of the underworld, Persephone, who during a previous lifetime, was the cheerful girl, Kora. 7 The basis of this poem is contrast, but Kora’s story is not only about suffering, as happened to the main character in the original myth. Instead, Kora is an indecisive woman whose inner conflict is between her common sense and her heart.1 Immanence becomes clear in this statement, “Four lovers stand around her bed, /One for body - one for head.” (Atwood 1961, 10) It is also important to note an introductory verse: “The field hieroglyphic lies.”