Danielle Scarvaglieri
Compare & contrast the love relationships in 1984 and The Handmaid’s Tale
Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and George Orwell’s 1984 are pieces of dystopian literature which embody repressive regimes and governments that rule through oppression and state controlled technology. One would think that love could not possibly be incorporated into such novels. Its antithesis, hate is understandably weaved in and expected, given the genre. However, in 1984 and The Handmaid’s Tale, two totalitarian stories, the authors have given their protagonists a love interest. It plays both a pivotal and underlying role. There appears many ways in which Atwood and Orwell have approached the love relationships.
Both protagonists are highly suspicious of their prospective love interests. Nick and Julia have been introduced in the two novels by chapter four to some degree, the early introduction highlighting their significance as characters. The level on uncertainty is shown through Offred considering Nick to be fishy and Winston not doubting that Julia was spying on him. Both also play with the idea that they might be government agents, and these sentiments as very ironic as one comes to realise that they form relationships, of which a fundamental aspects is trust. The idea of this is to highlight the societies they live in. It is also interesting to note they way they describe their significant others.
Immediately, one is drawn to the dark haired girl that becomes known as Julia, the word dark holding a connotation; it can be considered a hidden warning, that Julia is possibly a dangerous character of sorts, that she is an unknown anomaly, hinting she could be a ‘dark horse’. One can link this idea of it being a warning with when Winston wakes up with Shakespeare on his lips, which signifies that his Juliet will play a role in his life. These are both proleptic, and to an extent fatalistic as to Winston’s demise, as we unravel Julia’s and also the discovery that Winston eventually ends up in the place where there is no darkness. It is a simple yet effective initial description, helping us to feel the uncertainty the Winston feels. With Nick we are, unlike with Julia, given a detailed portrait. Significantly, Offred’s and Nick’s initial meeting occurs in the middle of the night. Again, the use of dark features when Offred describes him as a man made of darkness, and also when describing the hairs on his arms. Add to which his French face, it insinuates that he has something deep and abstruse about him, and the idea of his foreign demeanour heightens this theory of the unknown about him. One can look further into this idea of him being an outsider and link it to his part in the resistance, as an outsider of the regime. This notion can be backed up by the rebellious streak he has in the way he is depicted, with his cap being worn at a jaunty angle and also the cigarette he smokes showing that he has something to trade on the black market. The idea of rebellion is also seen in 1984 in chapter three. In Winston’s dream the way Julia tore off her clothes seemed to annihilate a…whole system. This dream is proleptic of the hope that Julia and Winston can bring Big Brother’s regime into disrepute through their relationship. Yet in this dream, Julia’s naked body aroused no desire in him, however we obtain an insight into the sexual frustration Offred feels despite herself by imagining how Nick might taste. It is possible that one can read into these feelings, that the regimes of Oceania, in Comparison to Gilead, has been more successful in eradicating these sexual desires both states want to remove.
