In a career defined by prophetic insight and unflinching prose, few revelations feel as illuminating as the moment Margaret Atwood recalls naming Offred – the protagonist of her dystopian classic The Handmaid’s Tale, Dua’s Monthly Read for November. In this Service95 Book Club exclusive, Margaret reads from her new memoir Book Of Lives, sharing how language and history fused into one name that would become iconic.
There is no dramatic flash of invention. Instead, Margaret recounts a quiet realisation – a name formed not from fantasy but from etymology, tradition, and ritual subjugation. In the excerpt, she reads:
“I arrived at Offred’s name by writing down a lot of male first names and putting of in front of them. Names in several languages are formed this way – some add son at the end, as in Anderson. Some put De or Von or Van in front, which may indicate a name or a family... Of has more meanings: the place you come from, belong to, or are owned by. In Offred it is primarily the latter: a Handmaid is owned, temporarily, by the man whose offspring she is expected to produce.”
In her interview with Dua (which you can watch here), Margaret elaborates, “I liked [Offred] because it has a couple of other words concealed in it, including ‘red’, which is the colour of the [Handmaid’s] outfit. And you learn to be a Handmaid at something called the Red Center.”
It’s an enlightening excerpt from Book Of Lives, and a reminder of the way Margaret continues to blur the line between imagined worlds and the one we live in.
Watch Margaret’s full reading video here or listen to it as a podcast here .
There’s More – Delve Deeper Into The Handmaid’s Tale With The Service95 Book Club...
- WATCH Dua’s interview with Margaret
- BOOKMARK the novels that inspired Margaret Atwood’s vision
- DISCOVER what to read next from Margaret’s back catalogue
- LISTEN to The Handmaid’s Tale playlist, curated by Margaret
- READ Dua’s essay on what reading The Handmaid’s Tale taught her about the world
- EXPLORE what The Handmaid’s Tale tells us about women’s rights today
- MEET the costume designer who brought Gilead to life for the screen
