How Does Margaret Atwood Represent Loneliness and Isolation in Chapter Two of ‘the Handmaid's Tale'?

How Does Margaret Atwood Represent Loneliness and Isolation in Chapter Two of ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’?

In ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’, Atwood chooses to successfully represent loneliness and isolation in several different ways throughout the novel, but they are especially apparent in Chapter Two. Atwood’s narrator, who we later learn is called Offred, is an enigma throughout the chapter, which adds to the altogether detached atmosphere already conveyed to us.

In the second chapter the author uses potent, poignant descriptions of the narrator’s environment in order to convey the total seemingly never ending monotony in her current life. The first example of this is the triadic noun structure employed with: ‘A chair, a table, a lamp’. This is a sharp, non-descriptive sentence, making use of unremarkable nouns to emphasise the crushing tedium the narrator is suffering through, the fact that she is resorting to listing mere objects in her room also suggests a kind of loneliness, as if she has no-one in her life to think of or care about, her mind is constantly blank and if left alone long enough, this will often lead to insanity. Subsequently, she is required to invent new ways to retain some sense of individuality, sanity and stability. The noun ‘white’ is similarly made use of to great effect, as this colour is conventionally utilised to signify purity and innocence, however when we consider the events in the rest of the novel, including acts indicating what is essentially rape occurring in the very same room, we can conclude to a reasonable degree of certainty that an ironic device is being employed by Atwood. The passage: ‘A blank space, plastered over’ is understood to be a metaphor for the patriarchal new society of Gilead, where the old world was all but apocalyptically destroyed, leaving in its place a blank space, which the Gileadean civilisation has aesthetically plastered over. The fact that the old world is mentioned through the ‘blank space’ further illuminates our understanding of Offred’s longing and desperation for the continuation of what once was (implying clear lonesomeness), even with this new society of subjugation attempting to crush this will. ‘Plastered over’ implicates to the reader a ridicule of the work in replacing the old world, as if it was a slapdash, hurried process. Finally, there are understated albeit noticeable references to family when the narrator is engaging in a description of the house; ‘Motherly sitting room, Grandfather Clock’; these proper nouns preceding the objects gives a sense of sardonicism to her narrative, in that the house she is residing in should be represented as welcoming, familiar and warm, but the subversion of these words, combined with the difficulties in the Commander’s relationship with his wife (who we later learn is called Serena Joy) and the fact that

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