A brief overview of Atwood and her life.

2.  Margaret Atwood is a Canadian poet, common
novelist, essayist and environmental activist.
 She is also a founder of the Writer’s Trust of
Canada, a non-profit literary organisation that
seeks to encourage Canada's writing
community.
 She was born in Ottawa, Canada and is the
second of three children.
 She began writing at the age of six and realised
she wanted to write professionally at the age of
sixteen.

3.  She graduated from the University of Toronto
in 1961 with a bachelor of arts in English and a
minor in Philosophy and French.
 In 1968, she married Jim Polk though divorced
in 1973. Atwood then formed a relationship
with Graeme Gibson, a fellow novelist, and
their daughter Eleanor Jess Atwood Gibson
was born in 1976.

4.  During the year ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ was
published, a bomb attack occurred in a
restaurant in Spain. The explosion killed 18
Spaniards and injured 82 others including 11
American servicemen who were believed to be
the target of the attack. The Islamic Jihad
Organisation claimed responsibility for the
blast. The novel begins with a staged terrorist
attack (blamed on Islamic extremist terrorists)
that kills the President and most of the
Congress.

5.  Attwood is well-known for her feminist views,
although she in never narrow-minded; in The
Handmaid’s Tale she raises questions rather than
just asserting her views.
 Women are the victims in Attwood’s society,
which can been seen through Gilead’s total
subjection on women, where even the Handmaid’s
identity is controlled by the male who owns them
in this patriarchal society.
 “Attwood may well be asking us to consider
whether such aggressive feminism may contribute
to an equally aggressive male reaction, as we see
in Gilead.”

6.  Attwood has been seen as having left wing
political views. However, she has said that she
is more of a Red Tory, in the traditional sense
of the word.
 Attwood is active within Canadian politics,
which is apparent when in 1987 she spoke out
against the free trade agreement between
Canada and the USA.
 In a Globe and Mail editorial, she urged
Canadians to vote for any other party to stop a
Conservative majority.

7.  Margaret Attwood is an environmental
activist.
 Member of the ‘Green Party’ of Canada and
also a member of the Rare Bird Club with
BirdLife International, therefore she was a
interested in the conservation and protection of
wildlife.


8.  www.crossref-it.info/textguide/The-
Handmaid’s-Tale/31/2166
 www.wikipedia.com