There are several similarities between Primo Levi’s polarising accounts of his experiences in the notorious Nazi concentration camp, Auschwitz, and Offred’s experiences in the totalitarian society of Gilead in Margret Atwood’s fragmented narrative The Handmaid’s Tale.
Firstly, the practice of being stripped from your name was prevalent in Nazi concentration camps and in Gilead too. Specifically, in Auschwitz, it served the purpose to dehumanise Jewish prisoners, and in Gilead, serves the purpose to classify people based on their usefulness to the state; it is a highly stratified society. Giving women a collective identity by giving them new names in correspondence to their usefulness (ie. Offred –> “Of Fred”, the one who belongs to [Commander] Fred), a new and standardised uniform that hides their skin and covers their faces, etc., to strip them of their individual identity. Through renaming, Nazi Germany and Gilead constantly remind the oppressed that they are nothing but property, serving as a way to dehumanise them. Further, the tattoo that Handmaids are marked with is similar to that which Primo Levi and other prisoners in Nazi camps were marked with to remind them of their status as property rather than human beings.
Also, the act of being completely stripped of your former self; having your most prized possessions taken away makes one, as Levi says, “hollow… reduced to suffering and needs forgetful of dignity and restraint, for he who loses all often easily loses himself.” In essence, when one is reduced to one’s core self, one loses a sense of self-worth and individualistic capacity. This idea is mirrored in the Handmaid’s Tale. In several parts of the novel, we see Offred slipping and succumbing to Gilead’s model of what a servant to the state must be. Offred, who has been stripped of her child– her most prized possession– keeps slipping in and out of the memory of her that she ponders whether it is best to lose all hope and simply consider her dead. However, Offred tries to maintain a sense of who she is on the inside as well as wear a mask in order to oblige to Gilead’s conformity. If she becomes Offred, she breaks and loses this self-worth and individualistic capacity.
Conversely, in the Handmaid’s Tale, Offred’s prisoner status acts as somewhat of a protective layering for her. When the doctor suggests impregnating Offred, she is fearful not only because she is aware of how the doctor could punish her if she defied him– by faking test results to frame her as infertile as a consequence of which she would be sent to the Colonies– by also because he has offered her somewhat of an escape. Offred’s reluctance seems inexplicable at first (especially considering her sympathy towards the sex-deprived man)– how could she not long to escape?– but it also illustrates the prisoner’s frame of mind. Offred wants to survive, but the best way to do so is by learning how to bear her chains. When she bears them too well, they become somewhat comforting for her. Her captivity becomes familiar whilst the uncertain prospect of a new, free life becomes scary.
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