Satire

Satire

the use of humour, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.

Examples of satire in 1984

- Pre-fix of 'victory' eg Victory Gin, Victory Mansions - Victory seen with positive connotations which opposes the idea of 'victory' eg "The hallway smelt of boiled cabbage and old rag mats." Orwell satirising WWII propaganda which uses buzzwords such as victory to give the illusion of superiority regardless of the true condition.- The Ministry of Love is concerned with torture, The Ministry of Truth - lies and propaganda, The Ministry of Peace - war. - Satire of fanaticism - blind acceptance of anything the party says eg in 1984 when the enemy of the war changes Similar to Britain changing allies after WWIIChild spies - Hitler encouraged the fanatical adulation of the young through the Hitler Youth movement - a situation echoed in Atwood's Gilead when she writes in chapter 4 of the Guardians of the Faith that: ‘The young ones are often the most dangerous, the most fanatical' 

Examples of satire in The Handmaid's Tale

- Satirisation of the religious right wing through the extreme control of fertility. - Similarities to Nazism and Hitler's ideas =  Hitler promised his followers a new Germany with a stress on family values. However, this rapidly turned into oppression of any who did not share his vision and the slaughter of those who were not of the ‘pure' Aryan race he demanded. Perhaps most poignantly, children of ‘undesirables' in Hitler's Germany were forcibly removed from their parents, to be adopted by loyal Nazis, reminding us of Offred's lost daughter. ‘Untermenschen' - less than human.  - Similarities with Mao's China Mao launched an appeal to those who believed in his ideas, and China's youth responded by forming the Red Guards. China's citizens found that, just as in Gilead, ‘The young ones are often the most dangerous, the most fanatical' Intellectuals were particularly singled out for ill-treatment and University life came to an end, as it does in Gilead Books were, as Offred comments wryly about Gilead in chapter 15, seen as ‘an incendiary device' and - except for ‘the Little Red Book', the Thoughts of Chairman Mao - were burned wholesale. Gilead too has severe restrictions on literature, and indeed on literacy

Handmaid's continued

Romania - banning of contraception  Some of Atwood's ideas about repressive laws in Gilead may be influenced by her observation of some Islamic societies and fundamentalist groups. Such groups wish to see strict Islamic attitudes imposed universally, including segregation of the sexes, very modest dress for women and a ban on dancing. Perhaps more notorious in the Western world is the Taliban, an extreme Islamic fundamentalist group which became particularly powerful in Afghanistan about ten years after the publication of The Handmaid's Tale. Taliban views include: A refusal to allow girls to be educated Insistence on women being fully covered, including the face, by a head-to-toe veil or burqa The imposition of brutal sentences, such as amputation and public stoning to death, for what are perceived as breaches of Sharia Law. Punishments such as flogging and amputation are still inflicted under Sharia law in Sudan and in Saudi Arabia, where currently women are not supposed to drive cars or to travel without being escorted by a male relative. Atwood's feminism makes her particularly hostile to such attitudes, which she observed at first hand in Afghanistan during her world tour in 1978.