The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood is an epistolary fiction whose 300 pages allow the reader to infer the structure of an entire apocalyptic society through the story of a character . The novel explores the author's speculations about how American society will evolve over the next century or two, creating a fictional historical narrative. The book ends with a scene from a historians' symposium, set even further in the future, during which the keynote speaker discusses a "so-called manuscript" of The Handmaid's Tale that has been discovered ( Atwood 300). This 12-page address allows the author to encourage reflection on how history as a whole should be documented and studied: are stories or raw facts, subjectivity or objectivity, more effective to understand the past? Atwood provokes reflection on the context and meaning of the book, the message of the epilogical “Historical Notes” section, and the process of academic research in today's world. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an Original Essay It is important to note that The Handmaid's Tale is itself a symbol. This can be determined by recognizing that each element in the book means something else, with many of these symbols highlighted and explained by Atwood. For example, to emphasize the importance of female fertility in the future society, Gilead, the narrator describes, "the great white canopy of Serena Joy's large colonial-style four-poster bed, hanging like a sagging cloud above us , a cloud dotted with strands of water. tiny drops of silvery rain that, if you looked closely, would turn into four-petaled flowers” ​​(Atwood 93). Other vivid visual images cause the narrator to reflect on the fact that the bed's canopy resembles the sail of a ship. She continues: “Sails with big bellies, they said in the poems. Belly. Propelled forward by a swollen belly” (Atwood 93). The character's train of thought takes the reader from an incredibly detailed description of a scene to a blatantly symbolic comment. The Handmaid's Tale is peppered with such events; the author shows throughout the book that almost everything has a second, more complex meaning. We can therefore consider that the novel itself is a symbol. The reader increasingly suspects that there is some kind of additional meaning in the sometimes bizarre epistolary form of the book, and this is confirmed almost conclusively in the final episode. Atwood undoubtedly disapproved of many facets of American society, her criticisms prompting her to write fiction about the bleak future she believed the country was heading toward. Stylized as a narrative, The Handmaid's Tale was probably intended to serve the dual purposes of being an engaging speculative piece and a demonstration by the author of a way of writing and understanding history. By the end of the book, it is clear that the symposium participants have a strong preference for fact-based history, although they seem to appreciate primary sources. The presentation given by the keynote speaker of the event is itself very informative, with sentences such as: There was also a negative incentive: childless or infertile women or older women who were not Married women could take service with aunts and thus escape dismissal. , and the resulting expedition to the infamous colonies, which were made up of portable populations used primarily as toxic cleanup crews, although if you.