Culture
‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ Is More Like Iran Than Modern America
When Margaret Atwood was asked about how she was inspired to come up with the fictional events of Gilead in her bestselling 1985 book “The Handmaid’s Tale,” which has since been adapted into a critically acclaimed TV series, she stopped the interviewer.
By Jaimee Marshall6 min read
“Nothing that I've written hasn't already happened and nothing that we build doesn't already exist,” Atwood said. While Gilead may be a fictional place set in a dystopian future within the United States, the events and subjugation of women’s rights that the fictional story is based upon are very real. As Atwood says, she didn’t just “make this all up” – she just relocated it to Cambridge, Massachusetts.