A Dystopian Paradise

I. NIGHT

CHAPTER 1

When I first read this short yet powerful chapter I was quite perplexed, but I was also overwhelmed to see how the author Margaret Atwood managed to use only words to paint such an ominous picture of what actually was a gymnasium; a place I normally associate with sports and teamwork. But she managed to capture every aspect of the gymnasium; from the glory of the players to the sex in the form of cheerleaders wearing short skirts and perfume. In doing so, she gave me an insight, a very accurate insight I must say, into the life of the average teenager; a time where hormones rage and being popular is the top priority. So reading the first two paragraphs, I thought that the speaker was a refugee who was reminiscing about her high school life, as she snuggled in old U.S. army-issued blankets in army cots in another gymnasium, but as I kept on reading I realised there was something wrong with the setup. Towards the end of the third paragraph she mentioned her ‘aunts’: Aunt Sara and Aunt Elizabeth, who I at first thought were caretakers and were in charge of making sure that everyone who slept in the old gymnasium remained safe, but ironically they had ‘electric cattle prods slung on thongs from their leather belts’. Surely that can’t be right? Ignoring my first question, I read on, only to further see that there was gender discrimination; ‘no guns though, even they could not be trusted with guns.’ This confused me even more; this book seems to be set in pretty modern times in the U.S., women are equal to men there so why would they not be allowed guns? And why would they even need guns? As I read on, more and more questions started to arise, but again, I decided to ignore them and carried on reading. Then she mentioned the guards who had guns who she said were ‘specially picked from the Angels’ So there’s some sort of authoritative hierarchy going on: Angels command the guards, the guards command the Aunts and finally the Aunts command the people in the gymnasium;