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The Handmaid's Tale

Introduction by Valerie Martin

Part of Everyman's Library Contemporary Classics Series

Author Margaret Atwood
Introduction by Valerie Martin
Look inside
Hardcover
$28.00 US
Knopf | Everyman's Library
On sale Oct 17, 2006 | 400 Pages | 978-0-307-26460-2
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  • English > Comparative Literature > 20th Century Film and Literature (1980-2000)
  • English > Comparative Literature > Dystopian Literature
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  • English > Comparative Literature: Commonwealth Nations > Canadian
  • English > Literature > British Literature Survey – 1640 to Present
  • English > Literature > Western Literature Survey – 17th Century to Present
  • English > Literature > World Literature Survey – 17th Century to Present
  • Interdisciplinary Studies > Women's and Gender Studies > Gender and Violence
  • Interdisciplinary Studies > Women's and Gender Studies > Women and Literature
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A gripping vision of our society radically overturned by a theocratic revolution, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid's Tale has become one of the most powerful and most widely read novels of our time.

Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead, serving in the household of the enigmatic Commander and his bitter wife. She may go out once a day to markets whose signs are now pictures because women are not allowed to read. She must pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, for in a time of declining birthrates her value lies in her fertility, and failure means exile to the dangerously polluted Colonies. Offred can remember a time when she lived with her husband and daughter and had a job, before she lost even her own name. Now she navigates the intimate secrets of those who control her every move, risking her life in breaking the rules.

Like Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World and George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, The Handmaid's Tale has endured not only as a literary landmark but as a warning of a possible future that is still chillingly relevant.


"The most poetically satisfying and intense of all Atwood's novels."
—Maclean's

"The Handmaid's Tale is in the honorable tradition of Brave New World and other warnings of dystopia. It's imaginative even audacious, and conveys a chilling sense of fear and menace."
—The Globe and Mail

"The Handmaid's Tale brings out the very best in Atwood--moral vision, biting humor, and a poet's imagination."
—Chatelaine
1

We slept in what had once been the gymnasium. The floor was of varnished wood, with stripes and circles painted on it, for the games that were formerly played there; the hoops for the basketball nets were still in place, though the nets were gone. A balcony ran around the room, for the spectators, and I thought I could smell, faintly like an afterimage, the pungent scent of sweat, shot through with the sweet taint of chewing gum and perfume from the watching girls, felt-skirted as I knew from pictures, later in miniskirts, then pants, then in one earring, spiky green-streaked hair. Dances would have been held there; the music lingered, a palimpsest of unheard sound, style upon style, an undercurrent of drums, a forlorn wail, garlands made of tissue-paper flowers, cardboard devils, a revolving ball of mirrors, powdering the dancers with a snow of light.

There was old sex in the room and loneliness, and expectation, of something without a shape or name. I remember that yearning, for something that was always about to happen and was never the same as the hands that were on us there and then, in the small of the back, or out back, in the parking lot, or in the television room with the sound turned down and only the pictures flickering over lifting flesh.

We yearned for the future. How did we learn it, that talent for insatiability? It was in the air; and it was still in the air, an afterthought, as we tried to sleep, in the army cots that had been set up in rows, with spaces between so we could not talk. We had flannelette sheets, like children's, and army-issue blankets, old ones that still said U.S. We folded our clothes neatly and laid them on the stools at the ends of the beds. The lights were turned down but not out. Aunt Sara and Aunt Elizabeth patrolled; they had electric cattle prods slung on thongs from their leather belts.

No guns though, even they could not be trusted with guns. Guns were for the guards, specially picked from the Angels. The guards weren't allowed inside the building except when called, and we weren't allowed out, except for our walks, twice daily, two by two around the football field, which was enclosed now by a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire. The Angels stood outside it with their backs to us. They were objects of fear to us, but of something else as well. If only they would look. If only we could talk to them. Something could be exchanged, we thought, some deal made, some tradeoff, we still had our bodies. That was our fantasy.

We learned to whisper almost without sound. In the semidarkness we could stretch out our arms, when the Aunts weren't looking, and touch each other's hands across space. We learned to lip-read, our heads flat on the beds, turned sideways, watching each other's mouths. In this way we exchanged names, from bed to bed:

Alma. Janine. Dolores. Moira. June.

II

Shopping

2

A chair, a table, a lamp. Above, on the white ceiling, a relief ornament in the shape of a wreath, and in the center of it a blank space, plastered over, like the place in a face where the eye has been taken out. There must have been a chandelier, once. They've removed anything you could tie a rope to.

A window, two white curtains. Under the window, a window seat with a little cushion. When the window is partly open--it only opens partly--the air can come in and make the curtains move. I can sit in the chair, or on the window seat, hands folded, and watch this. Sunlight comes in through the window too, and falls on the floor, which is made of wood, in narrow strips, highly polished. I can smell the polish. There's a rug on the floor, oval, of braided rags. This is the kind of touch they like: folk art, archaic, made by women, in their spare time, from things that have no further use. A return to traditional values. Waste not want not. I am not being wasted. Why do I want?

On the wall above the chair, a picture, framed but with no glass: a print of flowers, blue irises, watercolor. Flowers are still allowed. Does each of us have the same print, the same chair, the same white curtains, I wonder? Government issue?

Think of it as being in the army, said Aunt Lydia.

A bed. Single, mattress medium-hard, covered with a flocked white spread. Nothing takes place in the bed but sleep; or no sleep. I try not to think too much. Like other things now, thought must be rationed. There's a lot that doesn't bear thinking about. Thinking can hurt your chances, and I intend to last. I know why there is no glass, in front of the watercolor picture of blue irises, and why the window opens only partly and why the glass in it is shatterproof. It isn't running away they're afraid of. We wouldn't get far. It's those other escapes, the ones you can open in yourself, given a cutting edge.

So. Apart from these details, this could be a college guest room, for the less distinguished visitors; or a room in a rooming house, of former times, for ladies in reduced circumstances. That is what we are now. The circumstances have been reduced; for those of us who still have circumstances.

But a chair, sunlight, flowers: these are not to be dismissed. I am alive, I live, I breathe, I put my hand out, unfolded, into the sunlight. Where I am is not a prison but a privilege, as Aunt Lydia said, who was in love with either/or.

The bell that measures time is ringing. Time here is measured by bells, as once in nunneries. As in a nunnery too, there are few mirrors.

I get up out of the chair, advance my feet into the sunlight, in their red shoes, flat-heeled to save the spine and not for dancing. The red gloves are lying on the bed. I pick them up, pull them onto my hands, finger by finger. Everything except the wings around my face is red: the color of blood, which defines us. The skirt is ankle-length, full, gathered to a flat yoke that extends over the breasts, the sleeves are full. The white wings too are prescribed issue; they are to keep us from seeing, but also from being seen. I never looked good in red, it's not my color. I pick up the shopping basket, put it over my arm.

The door of the room--not my room, I refuse to say my--is not locked. In fact it doesn't shut properly. I go out into the polished hallway, which has a runner down the center, dusty pink. Like a path through the forest, like a carpet for royalty, it shows me the way.

The carpet bends and goes down the front staircase and I go with it, one hand on the banister, once a tree, turned in another century, rubbed to a warm gloss. Late Victorian, the house is, a family house, built for a large rich family. There's a grandfather clock in the hallway, which doles out time, and then the door to the motherly front sitting room, with its flesh tones and hints. A sitting room in which I never sit, but stand or kneel only. At the end of the hallway, above the front door, is a fanlight of colored glass: flowers, red and blue.

There remains a mirror, on the hall wall. If I turn my head so that the white wings framing my face direct my vision towards it, I can see it as I go down the stairs, round, convex, a pier glass, like the eye of a fish, and myself in it like a distorted shadow, a parody of something, some fairy-tale figure in a red cloak, descending towards a moment of carelessness that is the same as danger. A Sister, dipped in blood.

At the bottom of the stairs there's a hat-and-umbrella stand, the bentwood kind, long rounded rungs of wood curving gently up into hooks shaped like the opening fronds of a fern. There are several umbrellas in it: black, for the Commander, blue, for the Commander's Wife, and the one assigned to me, which is red. I leave the red umbrella where it is, because I know from the window that the day is sunny. I wonder whether or not the Commander's Wife is in the sitting room. She doesn't always sit. Sometimes I can hear her pacing back and forth, a heavy step and then a light one, and the soft tap of her cane on the dusty-rose carpet.

I walk along the hallway, past the sitting room door and the door that leads into the dining room, and open the door at the end of the hall and go through into the kitchen. Here the smell is no longer of furniture polish. Rita is in here, standing at the kitchen table, which has a top of chipped white enamel. She's in her usual Martha's dress, which is dull green, like a surgeon's gown of the time before. The dress is much like mine in shape, long and concealing, but with a bib apron over it and without the white wings and the veil. She puts on the veil to go outside, but nobody much cares who sees the face of a Martha. Her sleeves are rolled to the elbow, showing her brown arms. She's making bread, throwing the loaves for the final brief kneading and then the shaping.

Rita sees me and nods, whether in greeting or in simple acknowledgment of my presence it's hard to say, and wipes her floury hands on her apron and rummages in the kitchen drawer for the token book. Frowning, she tears out three tokens and hands them to me. Her face might be kindly if she would smile. But the frown isn't personal: it's the red dress she disapproves of, and what it stands for. She thinks I may be catching, like a disease or any form of bad luck.

Sometimes I listen outside closed doors, a thing I never would have done in the time before. I don't listen long, because I don't want to be caught doing it. Once, though, I heard Rita say to Cora that she wouldn't debase herself like that.

Nobody asking you, Cora said. Anyways, what could you do, supposing?

Go to the Colonies, Rita said. They have the choice.

With the Unwomen, and starve to death and Lord knows what all? said Cora. Catch you.

They were shelling peas; even through the almost-closed door I could hear the light clink of the hard peas falling into the metal bowl. I heard Rita, a grunt or a sigh, of protest or agreement.

Anyways, they're doing it for us all, said Cora, or so they say. If I hadn't of got my tubes tied, it could of been me, say I was ten years younger. It's not that bad. It's not what you'd call hard work.

Better her than me, Rita said, and I opened the door. Their faces were the way women's faces are when they've been talking about you behind your back and they think you've heard: embarrassed, but also a little defiant, as if it were their right. That day, Cora was more pleasant to me than usual, Rita more surly.

Today, despite Rita's closed face and pressed lips, I would like to stay here, in the kitchen. Cora might come in, from somewhere else in the house, carrying her bottle of lemon oil and her duster, and Rita would make coffee--in the houses of the Commanders there is still real coffee--and we would sit at Rita's kitchen table, which is not Rita's any more than my table is mine, and we would talk, about aches and pains, illnesses, our feet, our backs, all the different kinds of mischief that our bodies, like unruly children, can get into. We would nod our heads as punctuation to each other's voices, signaling that yes, we know all about it. We would exchange remedies and try to outdo each other in the recital of our physical miseries; gently we would complain, our voices soft and minor key and mournful as pigeons in the eaves troughs. I know what you mean, we'd say. Or, a quaint expression you sometimes hear, still, from older people: I hear where you're coming from, as if the voice itself were a traveler, arriving from a distant place. Which it would be, which it is.

How I used to despise such talk. Now I long for it. At least it was talk. An exchange, of sorts.

Or we would gossip. The Marthas know things, they talk among themselves, passing the unofficial news from house to house. Like me, they listen at doors, no doubt, and see things even with their eyes averted. I've heard them at it sometimes, caught whiffs of their private conversations. Stillborn, it was. Or, Stabbed her with a knitting needle, right in the belly. Jealousy, it must have been, eating her up. Or, tantalizingly, It was toilet cleaner she used. Worked like a charm, though you'd think he'd of tasted it. Must've been that drunk; but they found her out all right.

Or I would help Rita make the bread, sinking my hands into that soft resistant warmth which is so much like flesh. I hunger to touch something, other than cloth or wood. I hunger to commit the act of touch.

But even if I were to ask, even if I were to violate decorum to that extent, Rita would not allow it. She would be too afraid. The Marthas are not supposed to fraternize with us.

Fraternize means to behave like a brother. Luke told me that. He said there was no corresponding word that meant to behave like a sister. Sororize, it would have to be, he said. From the Latin. He liked knowing about such details. The derivations of words, curious usages. I used to tease him about being pedantic.

I take the tokens from Rita's outstretched hand. They have pictures on them, of the things they can be exchanged for: twelve eggs, a piece of cheese, a brown thing that's supposed to be a steak. I place them in the zippered pocket in my sleeve, where I keep my pass.

"Tell them fresh, for the eggs," she says. "Not like last time. And a chicken, tell them, not a hen. Tell them who it's for and then they won't mess around."

"All right," I say. I don't smile. Why tempt her to friendship?

3

I go out by the back door, into the garden, which is large and tidy: a lawn in the middle, a willow, weeping catkins; around the edges, the flower borders, in which the daffodils are now fading and the tulips are opening their cups, spilling out color. The tulips are red, a darker crimson towards the stem, as if they have been cut and are beginning to heal there.

This garden is the domain of the Commander's Wife. Looking out through my shatterproof window I've often seen her in it, her knees on a cushion, a light blue veil thrown over her wide gardening hat, a basket at her side with shears in it and pieces of string for tying the flowers into place. A Guardian detailed to the Commander does the heavy digging; the Commander's Wife directs, pointing with her stick. Many of the Wives have such gardens, it's something for them to order and maintain and care for.

I once had a garden. I can remember the smell of the turned earth, the plump shapes of bulbs held in the hands, fullness, the dry rustle of seeds through the fingers. Time could pass more swiftly that way. Sometimes the Commander's Wife has a chair brought out, and just sits in it, in her garden. From a distance it looks like peace.

She isn't here now, and I start to wonder where she is: I don't like to come upon the Commander's Wife unexpectedly. Perhaps she's sewing, in the sitting room, with her left foot on the footstool, because of her arthritis. Or knitting scarves, for the Angels at the front lines. I can hardly believe the Angels have a need for such scarves; anyway, the ones made by the Commander's Wife are too elaborate. She doesn't bother with the cross-and-star pattern used by many of the other Wives, it's not a challenge. Fir trees march across the ends of her scarves, or eagles, or stiff humanoid figures, boy and girl, boy and girl. They aren't scarves for grown men but for children.
Copyright © 1998 by Margaret Atwood. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
  • FINALIST | 1986
    Booker Prize
© Luis Mora
Margaret Atwood is the author of more than fifty books of fiction, poetry and critical essays. Her novels include Cat’s Eye, The Robber Bride, Alias Grace, The Blind Assassin, and the MaddAddam trilogy. Her 1985 classic, The Handmaid’s Tale, was followed in 2019 by a sequel, The Testaments, which was a global number one bestseller and won the Booker Prize. In 2020 she published Dearly, her first collection of poetry for a decade.
 
Atwood has won numerous awards including the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Imagination in Service to Society, the Franz Kafka Prize, the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade, the PEN USA Lifetime Achievement Award and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. In 2019 she was made a member of the Order of the Companions of Honour for services to literature. She has also worked as a cartoonist, illustrator, librettist, playwright and puppeteer. She lives in Toronto, Canada. View titles by Margaret Atwood

About

A gripping vision of our society radically overturned by a theocratic revolution, Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid's Tale has become one of the most powerful and most widely read novels of our time.

Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead, serving in the household of the enigmatic Commander and his bitter wife. She may go out once a day to markets whose signs are now pictures because women are not allowed to read. She must pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, for in a time of declining birthrates her value lies in her fertility, and failure means exile to the dangerously polluted Colonies. Offred can remember a time when she lived with her husband and daughter and had a job, before she lost even her own name. Now she navigates the intimate secrets of those who control her every move, risking her life in breaking the rules.

Like Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World and George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, The Handmaid's Tale has endured not only as a literary landmark but as a warning of a possible future that is still chillingly relevant.


"The most poetically satisfying and intense of all Atwood's novels."
—Maclean's

"The Handmaid's Tale is in the honorable tradition of Brave New World and other warnings of dystopia. It's imaginative even audacious, and conveys a chilling sense of fear and menace."
—The Globe and Mail

"The Handmaid's Tale brings out the very best in Atwood--moral vision, biting humor, and a poet's imagination."
—Chatelaine

Excerpt

1

We slept in what had once been the gymnasium. The floor was of varnished wood, with stripes and circles painted on it, for the games that were formerly played there; the hoops for the basketball nets were still in place, though the nets were gone. A balcony ran around the room, for the spectators, and I thought I could smell, faintly like an afterimage, the pungent scent of sweat, shot through with the sweet taint of chewing gum and perfume from the watching girls, felt-skirted as I knew from pictures, later in miniskirts, then pants, then in one earring, spiky green-streaked hair. Dances would have been held there; the music lingered, a palimpsest of unheard sound, style upon style, an undercurrent of drums, a forlorn wail, garlands made of tissue-paper flowers, cardboard devils, a revolving ball of mirrors, powdering the dancers with a snow of light.

There was old sex in the room and loneliness, and expectation, of something without a shape or name. I remember that yearning, for something that was always about to happen and was never the same as the hands that were on us there and then, in the small of the back, or out back, in the parking lot, or in the television room with the sound turned down and only the pictures flickering over lifting flesh.

We yearned for the future. How did we learn it, that talent for insatiability? It was in the air; and it was still in the air, an afterthought, as we tried to sleep, in the army cots that had been set up in rows, with spaces between so we could not talk. We had flannelette sheets, like children's, and army-issue blankets, old ones that still said U.S. We folded our clothes neatly and laid them on the stools at the ends of the beds. The lights were turned down but not out. Aunt Sara and Aunt Elizabeth patrolled; they had electric cattle prods slung on thongs from their leather belts.

No guns though, even they could not be trusted with guns. Guns were for the guards, specially picked from the Angels. The guards weren't allowed inside the building except when called, and we weren't allowed out, except for our walks, twice daily, two by two around the football field, which was enclosed now by a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire. The Angels stood outside it with their backs to us. They were objects of fear to us, but of something else as well. If only they would look. If only we could talk to them. Something could be exchanged, we thought, some deal made, some tradeoff, we still had our bodies. That was our fantasy.

We learned to whisper almost without sound. In the semidarkness we could stretch out our arms, when the Aunts weren't looking, and touch each other's hands across space. We learned to lip-read, our heads flat on the beds, turned sideways, watching each other's mouths. In this way we exchanged names, from bed to bed:

Alma. Janine. Dolores. Moira. June.

II

Shopping

2

A chair, a table, a lamp. Above, on the white ceiling, a relief ornament in the shape of a wreath, and in the center of it a blank space, plastered over, like the place in a face where the eye has been taken out. There must have been a chandelier, once. They've removed anything you could tie a rope to.

A window, two white curtains. Under the window, a window seat with a little cushion. When the window is partly open--it only opens partly--the air can come in and make the curtains move. I can sit in the chair, or on the window seat, hands folded, and watch this. Sunlight comes in through the window too, and falls on the floor, which is made of wood, in narrow strips, highly polished. I can smell the polish. There's a rug on the floor, oval, of braided rags. This is the kind of touch they like: folk art, archaic, made by women, in their spare time, from things that have no further use. A return to traditional values. Waste not want not. I am not being wasted. Why do I want?

On the wall above the chair, a picture, framed but with no glass: a print of flowers, blue irises, watercolor. Flowers are still allowed. Does each of us have the same print, the same chair, the same white curtains, I wonder? Government issue?

Think of it as being in the army, said Aunt Lydia.

A bed. Single, mattress medium-hard, covered with a flocked white spread. Nothing takes place in the bed but sleep; or no sleep. I try not to think too much. Like other things now, thought must be rationed. There's a lot that doesn't bear thinking about. Thinking can hurt your chances, and I intend to last. I know why there is no glass, in front of the watercolor picture of blue irises, and why the window opens only partly and why the glass in it is shatterproof. It isn't running away they're afraid of. We wouldn't get far. It's those other escapes, the ones you can open in yourself, given a cutting edge.

So. Apart from these details, this could be a college guest room, for the less distinguished visitors; or a room in a rooming house, of former times, for ladies in reduced circumstances. That is what we are now. The circumstances have been reduced; for those of us who still have circumstances.

But a chair, sunlight, flowers: these are not to be dismissed. I am alive, I live, I breathe, I put my hand out, unfolded, into the sunlight. Where I am is not a prison but a privilege, as Aunt Lydia said, who was in love with either/or.

The bell that measures time is ringing. Time here is measured by bells, as once in nunneries. As in a nunnery too, there are few mirrors.

I get up out of the chair, advance my feet into the sunlight, in their red shoes, flat-heeled to save the spine and not for dancing. The red gloves are lying on the bed. I pick them up, pull them onto my hands, finger by finger. Everything except the wings around my face is red: the color of blood, which defines us. The skirt is ankle-length, full, gathered to a flat yoke that extends over the breasts, the sleeves are full. The white wings too are prescribed issue; they are to keep us from seeing, but also from being seen. I never looked good in red, it's not my color. I pick up the shopping basket, put it over my arm.

The door of the room--not my room, I refuse to say my--is not locked. In fact it doesn't shut properly. I go out into the polished hallway, which has a runner down the center, dusty pink. Like a path through the forest, like a carpet for royalty, it shows me the way.

The carpet bends and goes down the front staircase and I go with it, one hand on the banister, once a tree, turned in another century, rubbed to a warm gloss. Late Victorian, the house is, a family house, built for a large rich family. There's a grandfather clock in the hallway, which doles out time, and then the door to the motherly front sitting room, with its flesh tones and hints. A sitting room in which I never sit, but stand or kneel only. At the end of the hallway, above the front door, is a fanlight of colored glass: flowers, red and blue.

There remains a mirror, on the hall wall. If I turn my head so that the white wings framing my face direct my vision towards it, I can see it as I go down the stairs, round, convex, a pier glass, like the eye of a fish, and myself in it like a distorted shadow, a parody of something, some fairy-tale figure in a red cloak, descending towards a moment of carelessness that is the same as danger. A Sister, dipped in blood.

At the bottom of the stairs there's a hat-and-umbrella stand, the bentwood kind, long rounded rungs of wood curving gently up into hooks shaped like the opening fronds of a fern. There are several umbrellas in it: black, for the Commander, blue, for the Commander's Wife, and the one assigned to me, which is red. I leave the red umbrella where it is, because I know from the window that the day is sunny. I wonder whether or not the Commander's Wife is in the sitting room. She doesn't always sit. Sometimes I can hear her pacing back and forth, a heavy step and then a light one, and the soft tap of her cane on the dusty-rose carpet.

I walk along the hallway, past the sitting room door and the door that leads into the dining room, and open the door at the end of the hall and go through into the kitchen. Here the smell is no longer of furniture polish. Rita is in here, standing at the kitchen table, which has a top of chipped white enamel. She's in her usual Martha's dress, which is dull green, like a surgeon's gown of the time before. The dress is much like mine in shape, long and concealing, but with a bib apron over it and without the white wings and the veil. She puts on the veil to go outside, but nobody much cares who sees the face of a Martha. Her sleeves are rolled to the elbow, showing her brown arms. She's making bread, throwing the loaves for the final brief kneading and then the shaping.

Rita sees me and nods, whether in greeting or in simple acknowledgment of my presence it's hard to say, and wipes her floury hands on her apron and rummages in the kitchen drawer for the token book. Frowning, she tears out three tokens and hands them to me. Her face might be kindly if she would smile. But the frown isn't personal: it's the red dress she disapproves of, and what it stands for. She thinks I may be catching, like a disease or any form of bad luck.

Sometimes I listen outside closed doors, a thing I never would have done in the time before. I don't listen long, because I don't want to be caught doing it. Once, though, I heard Rita say to Cora that she wouldn't debase herself like that.

Nobody asking you, Cora said. Anyways, what could you do, supposing?

Go to the Colonies, Rita said. They have the choice.

With the Unwomen, and starve to death and Lord knows what all? said Cora. Catch you.

They were shelling peas; even through the almost-closed door I could hear the light clink of the hard peas falling into the metal bowl. I heard Rita, a grunt or a sigh, of protest or agreement.

Anyways, they're doing it for us all, said Cora, or so they say. If I hadn't of got my tubes tied, it could of been me, say I was ten years younger. It's not that bad. It's not what you'd call hard work.

Better her than me, Rita said, and I opened the door. Their faces were the way women's faces are when they've been talking about you behind your back and they think you've heard: embarrassed, but also a little defiant, as if it were their right. That day, Cora was more pleasant to me than usual, Rita more surly.

Today, despite Rita's closed face and pressed lips, I would like to stay here, in the kitchen. Cora might come in, from somewhere else in the house, carrying her bottle of lemon oil and her duster, and Rita would make coffee--in the houses of the Commanders there is still real coffee--and we would sit at Rita's kitchen table, which is not Rita's any more than my table is mine, and we would talk, about aches and pains, illnesses, our feet, our backs, all the different kinds of mischief that our bodies, like unruly children, can get into. We would nod our heads as punctuation to each other's voices, signaling that yes, we know all about it. We would exchange remedies and try to outdo each other in the recital of our physical miseries; gently we would complain, our voices soft and minor key and mournful as pigeons in the eaves troughs. I know what you mean, we'd say. Or, a quaint expression you sometimes hear, still, from older people: I hear where you're coming from, as if the voice itself were a traveler, arriving from a distant place. Which it would be, which it is.

How I used to despise such talk. Now I long for it. At least it was talk. An exchange, of sorts.

Or we would gossip. The Marthas know things, they talk among themselves, passing the unofficial news from house to house. Like me, they listen at doors, no doubt, and see things even with their eyes averted. I've heard them at it sometimes, caught whiffs of their private conversations. Stillborn, it was. Or, Stabbed her with a knitting needle, right in the belly. Jealousy, it must have been, eating her up. Or, tantalizingly, It was toilet cleaner she used. Worked like a charm, though you'd think he'd of tasted it. Must've been that drunk; but they found her out all right.

Or I would help Rita make the bread, sinking my hands into that soft resistant warmth which is so much like flesh. I hunger to touch something, other than cloth or wood. I hunger to commit the act of touch.

But even if I were to ask, even if I were to violate decorum to that extent, Rita would not allow it. She would be too afraid. The Marthas are not supposed to fraternize with us.

Fraternize means to behave like a brother. Luke told me that. He said there was no corresponding word that meant to behave like a sister. Sororize, it would have to be, he said. From the Latin. He liked knowing about such details. The derivations of words, curious usages. I used to tease him about being pedantic.

I take the tokens from Rita's outstretched hand. They have pictures on them, of the things they can be exchanged for: twelve eggs, a piece of cheese, a brown thing that's supposed to be a steak. I place them in the zippered pocket in my sleeve, where I keep my pass.

"Tell them fresh, for the eggs," she says. "Not like last time. And a chicken, tell them, not a hen. Tell them who it's for and then they won't mess around."

"All right," I say. I don't smile. Why tempt her to friendship?

3

I go out by the back door, into the garden, which is large and tidy: a lawn in the middle, a willow, weeping catkins; around the edges, the flower borders, in which the daffodils are now fading and the tulips are opening their cups, spilling out color. The tulips are red, a darker crimson towards the stem, as if they have been cut and are beginning to heal there.

This garden is the domain of the Commander's Wife. Looking out through my shatterproof window I've often seen her in it, her knees on a cushion, a light blue veil thrown over her wide gardening hat, a basket at her side with shears in it and pieces of string for tying the flowers into place. A Guardian detailed to the Commander does the heavy digging; the Commander's Wife directs, pointing with her stick. Many of the Wives have such gardens, it's something for them to order and maintain and care for.

I once had a garden. I can remember the smell of the turned earth, the plump shapes of bulbs held in the hands, fullness, the dry rustle of seeds through the fingers. Time could pass more swiftly that way. Sometimes the Commander's Wife has a chair brought out, and just sits in it, in her garden. From a distance it looks like peace.

She isn't here now, and I start to wonder where she is: I don't like to come upon the Commander's Wife unexpectedly. Perhaps she's sewing, in the sitting room, with her left foot on the footstool, because of her arthritis. Or knitting scarves, for the Angels at the front lines. I can hardly believe the Angels have a need for such scarves; anyway, the ones made by the Commander's Wife are too elaborate. She doesn't bother with the cross-and-star pattern used by many of the other Wives, it's not a challenge. Fir trees march across the ends of her scarves, or eagles, or stiff humanoid figures, boy and girl, boy and girl. They aren't scarves for grown men but for children.
Copyright © 1998 by Margaret Atwood. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

Awards

  • FINALIST | 1986
    Booker Prize

Author

© Luis Mora
Margaret Atwood is the author of more than fifty books of fiction, poetry and critical essays. Her novels include Cat’s Eye, The Robber Bride, Alias Grace, The Blind Assassin, and the MaddAddam trilogy. Her 1985 classic, The Handmaid’s Tale, was followed in 2019 by a sequel, The Testaments, which was a global number one bestseller and won the Booker Prize. In 2020 she published Dearly, her first collection of poetry for a decade.
 
Atwood has won numerous awards including the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Imagination in Service to Society, the Franz Kafka Prize, the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade, the PEN USA Lifetime Achievement Award and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. In 2019 she was made a member of the Order of the Companions of Honour for services to literature. She has also worked as a cartoonist, illustrator, librettist, playwright and puppeteer. She lives in Toronto, Canada. View titles by Margaret Atwood

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    The Lady in the Lake, The Little Sister, The Long Goodbye, Playback
    Introduction by Tom Hiney
    Raymond Chandler
    978-0-375-41502-9
    $32.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Oct 15, 2002
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    Introduction by John Carey
    George Orwell
    978-0-375-41503-6
    $42.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Oct 15, 2002
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    My Name Is Red
    Orhan Pamuk
    978-0-375-70685-1
    $17.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Aug 27, 2002
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    The Rainbow
    D.H. Lawrence
    978-0-375-75965-9
    $12.00 US
    Paperback
    Modern Library
    Feb 12, 2002
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    The Cairo Trilogy
    Palace Walk, Palace of Desire, Sugar Street; Introduction by Sabry Hafez
    Naguib Mahfouz
    978-0-375-41331-5
    $40.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Oct 16, 2001
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    Introduction by Malcolm Bradbury
    John Updike
    978-0-375-41176-2
    $25.00 US
    Hardcover
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    978-0-375-70716-2
    $18.00 US
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    W. Somerset Maugham
    978-0-375-75315-2
    $14.00 US
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    Modern Library
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    Elizabeth Bowen
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    Everyman's Library
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    The Underworld U.S.A. Trilogy, Volume I
    American Tabloid, The Cold Six Thousand; Introduction by Thomas Mallon
    James Ellroy
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    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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    The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, L.A. Confidential, White Jazz; Introduction by Tom Nolan
    James Ellroy
    978-1-101-90805-1
    $40.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Jun 04, 2019
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    The Underworld U.S.A. Trilogy, Volume II
    Blood's A Rover
    James Ellroy
    978-1-101-90814-3
    $32.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Jun 04, 2019
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    Introduction by Garth Risk Hallberg
    Henrik Pontoppidan
    978-1-101-90809-9
    $28.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Apr 16, 2019
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    All Quiet on the Western Front
    Introduction by Norman Stone
    Erich Maria Remarque
    978-1-101-90808-2
    $26.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Sep 18, 2018
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    Introduction by Miranda Seymour
    Robert Graves
    978-1-101-90798-6
    $28.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Apr 24, 2018
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    The Bloody Chamber, Wise Children, Fireworks
    Introduction by Joan Acocella
    Angela Carter
    978-1-101-90799-3
    $27.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Apr 10, 2018
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    The Lover, Wartime Notebooks, Practicalities
    Introduction by Rachel Kushner
    Marguerite Duras
    978-1-101-90793-1
    $30.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Nov 14, 2017
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    Rebecca
    Introduction by Lucy Hughes-Hallett
    Daphne du Maurier
    978-1-101-90787-0
    $30.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Feb 07, 2017
  • The Collected Stories of Mavis Gallant
    The Collected Stories of Mavis Gallant
    Introduction by Francine Prose
    Mavis Gallant
    978-1-101-90763-4
    $35.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • The Sea, the Sea; A Severed Head
    The Sea, the Sea; A Severed Head
    Introduction by Sarah Churchwell
    Iris Murdoch
    978-1-101-90766-5
    $30.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Apr 05, 2016
  • Go Tell It on the Mountain
    Go Tell It on the Mountain
    Introduction by Edwidge Danticat
    James Baldwin
    978-1-101-90761-0
    $24.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Mar 01, 2016
  • Giovanni's Room
    Giovanni's Room
    Introduction by Colm Tóibín
    James Baldwin
    978-1-101-90774-0
    $24.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Mar 01, 2016
  • The Adventures of Augie March
    The Adventures of Augie March
    Introduction by Martin Amis
    Saul Bellow
    978-1-101-90771-9
    $28.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Aug 04, 2015
  • The Book of Evidence, The Sea
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    Introduction by Adam Phillips
    John Banville
    978-0-375-71272-2
    $25.95 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • Hopscotch, Blow-Up, We Love Glenda So Much
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    978-0-375-71266-1
    $30.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • The Transylvanian Trilogy, Volume I
    The Transylvanian Trilogy, Volume I
    They Were Counted; Introduction by Hugh Thomas
    Miklos Banffy
    978-0-375-71229-6
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    They Were Found Wanting, They Were Divided; Introduction by Patrick Thursfield
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    Everyman's Library
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  • The Skeptical Romancer
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    Selected Travel Writing
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    978-0-307-74420-3
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    Paperback
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    The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, The Amber Spyglass; Introduction by Lucy Hughes-Hallett
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    Everyman's Library
    Dec 06, 2011
  • Doctor Zhivago
    Doctor Zhivago
    Boris Pasternak
    978-0-307-39095-0
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    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 04, 2011
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    A Room with a View, Where Angels Fear to Tread
    Introduction by Ann Pasternak Slater
    E.M. Forster
    978-0-307-70090-2
    $28.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Oct 04, 2011
  • Collected Short Fiction of V. S. Naipaul
    Collected Short Fiction of V. S. Naipaul
    V. S. Naipaul
    978-0-307-59402-0
    $25.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Apr 12, 2011
  • Burmese Days, Keep the Aspidistra Flying, Coming Up for Air
    Burmese Days, Keep the Aspidistra Flying, Coming Up for Air
    Introduction by John Carey
    George Orwell
    978-0-307-59504-1
    $28.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Apr 05, 2011
  • Foundation, Foundation and Empire, Second Foundation
    Foundation, Foundation and Empire, Second Foundation
    Introduction by Michael Dirda
    Isaac Asimov
    978-0-307-59396-2
    $32.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Nov 02, 2010
  • The Stories of Ray Bradbury
    The Stories of Ray Bradbury
    Introduction by Christopher Buckley
    Ray Bradbury
    978-0-307-26905-8
    $35.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Apr 06, 2010
  • Flashman, Flash for Freedom!, Flashman in the Great Game
    Flashman, Flash for Freedom!, Flashman in the Great Game
    Introduction by Michael Dirda
    George MacDonald Fraser
    978-0-307-59268-2
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    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Feb 02, 2010
  • The African Trilogy
    The African Trilogy
    Things Fall Apart, No Longer at Ease, and Arrow of God; Introduction by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
    Chinua Achebe
    978-0-307-59270-5
    $30.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Jan 05, 2010
  • This Side of Paradise
    This Side of Paradise
    F. Scott Fitzgerald
    978-0-307-47451-3
    $12.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 08, 2009
  • The Best of Frank O'Connor
    The Best of Frank O'Connor
    Introduction by Julian Barnes
    Frank O'Connor
    978-0-307-26904-1
    $27.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Jun 09, 2009
  • The Bascombe Novels
    The Bascombe Novels
    Written and Introduced by Richard Ford
    Richard Ford
    978-0-307-26903-4
    $35.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Apr 14, 2009
  • Revolutionary Road, The Easter Parade, Eleven Kinds of Loneliness
    Revolutionary Road, The Easter Parade, Eleven Kinds of Loneliness
    Introduction by Richard Price
    Richard Yates
    978-0-307-27089-4
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    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • David Golder, The Ball, Snow in Autumn, The Courilof Affair
    David Golder, The Ball, Snow in Autumn, The Courilof Affair
    Introduction by Claire Messud
    Irene Nemirovsky
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    Everyman's Library
    Jan 15, 2008
  • The Complete Novels of Flann O'Brien
    The Complete Novels of Flann O'Brien
    Introduction by Keith Donohue
    Flann O'Brien
    978-0-307-26749-8
    $35.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • The Collected Works of Kahlil Gibran
    The Collected Works of Kahlil Gibran
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    Everyman's Library
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  • Love in the Time of Cholera
    Love in the Time of Cholera
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    Paperback
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  • The Raj Quartet (1)
    The Raj Quartet (1)
    The Jewel in the Crown, The Day of the Scorpion; Introduction by Hilary Spurling
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    $35.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • The Raj Quartet (2)
    The Raj Quartet (2)
    The Towers of Silence, A Division of the Spoils; Introduction by Hilary Spurling
    Paul Scott
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    Everyman's Library
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  • The Best of Wodehouse
    The Best of Wodehouse
    An Anthology; Introduction by John Mortimer
    P.G. Wodehouse
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    $35.00 US
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    Everyman's Library
    Jun 19, 2007
  • Three Novels of Ancient Egypt: Khufu's Wisdom, Rhadopis of Nubia, Thebes at War
    Three Novels of Ancient Egypt: Khufu's Wisdom, Rhadopis of Nubia, Thebes at War
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    Naguib Mahfouz
    978-0-307-26624-8
    $30.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live
    We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live
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    Joan Didion
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    $40.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • Collected Stories of Roald Dahl
    Collected Stories of Roald Dahl
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    Roald Dahl
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    $32.00 US
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    Everyman's Library
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    A Personal Selection of Stories; Introduction by Margaret Atwood
    Alice Munro
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    $27.00 US
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    Everyman's Library
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    Umberto Eco
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    Everyman's Library
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    Salman Rushdie
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    Random House Trade Paperbacks
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    Swami and Friends, The Bachelor of Arts, The Dark Room, The English Teacher
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    Everyman's Library
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    Mr. Sampath-The Printer of Malgudi, The Financial Expert, Waiting for the Mahatma
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    R. K. Narayan
    978-1-4000-4477-1
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    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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    Orhan Pamuk
    978-0-375-70686-8
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jul 19, 2005
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    The Garden of the Finzi-Continis
    Introduction by Tim Parks
    Giorgio Bassani
    978-1-4000-4422-1
    $23.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Jul 19, 2005
  • Joseph and His Brothers
    Joseph and His Brothers
    Translated and Introduced by John E. Woods
    Thomas Mann
    978-1-4000-4001-8
    $45.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • The House of the Spirits
    The House of the Spirits
    Introduced by Christopher Hitchens
    Isabel Allende
    978-1-4000-4318-7
    $28.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • The Woman Warrior, China Men
    The Woman Warrior, China Men
    Introduction by Mary Gordon
    Maxine Hong Kingston
    978-1-4000-4384-2
    $28.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • The Plague, The Fall, Exile and the Kingdom, and Selected Essays
    The Plague, The Fall, Exile and the Kingdom, and Selected Essays
    Introduction by David Bellos
    Albert Camus
    978-1-4000-4255-5
    $28.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • Collected Stories of W. Somerset Maugham
    Collected Stories of W. Somerset Maugham
    Introduction by Nicholas Shakespeare
    W. Somerset Maugham
    978-1-4000-4253-1
    $28.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
    Jul 06, 2004
  • Beloved
    Beloved
    Toni Morrison
    978-1-4000-3341-6
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
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    Song of Solomon
    Toni Morrison
    978-1-4000-3342-3
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jun 08, 2004
  • The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, The Girls of Slender Means, The Driver's Seat, The Only Problem
    The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, The Girls of Slender Means, The Driver's Seat, The Only Problem
    Introduction by Frank Kermode
    Muriel Spark
    978-1-4000-4206-7
    $30.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • A Thousand Acres
    A Thousand Acres
    A Novel
    Jane Smiley
    978-1-4000-3383-6
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Dec 02, 2003
  • The General in His Labyrinth
    The General in His Labyrinth
    Gabriel García Márquez
    978-1-4000-3470-3
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 07, 2003
  • Offshore, Human Voices, The Beginning of Spring
    Offshore, Human Voices, The Beginning of Spring
    Introduction by John Bayley
    Penelope Fitzgerald
    978-1-4000-4125-1
    $30.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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    Introduction by Frank Kermode
    Penelope Fitzgerald
    978-1-4000-4126-8
    $27.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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  • The Postman Always Rings Twice, Double Indemnity, Mildred Pierce, and Selected Stories
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    Introduction by Robert Polito
    James M. Cain
    978-0-375-41438-1
    $35.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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    A Novel
    Ian McEwan
    978-0-385-72179-0
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Feb 25, 2003
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    Zeno's Conscience
    A Novel
    Italo Svevo
    978-0-375-72776-4
    $17.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Feb 04, 2003
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    Introduction by John Bayley
    Raymond Chandler
    978-0-375-41500-5
    $35.00 US
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    Everyman's Library
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    Introduction by Diane Johnson
    Raymond Chandler
    978-0-375-41501-2
    $30.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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    The Lady in the Lake, The Little Sister, The Long Goodbye, Playback
    Introduction by Tom Hiney
    Raymond Chandler
    978-0-375-41502-9
    $32.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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    Orwell: Essays
    Introduction by John Carey
    George Orwell
    978-0-375-41503-6
    $42.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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    My Name Is Red
    Orhan Pamuk
    978-0-375-70685-1
    $17.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
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    The Rainbow
    D.H. Lawrence
    978-0-375-75965-9
    $12.00 US
    Paperback
    Modern Library
    Feb 12, 2002
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    The Cairo Trilogy
    Palace Walk, Palace of Desire, Sugar Street; Introduction by Sabry Hafez
    Naguib Mahfouz
    978-0-375-41331-5
    $40.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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    Introduction by Malcolm Bradbury
    John Updike
    978-0-375-41176-2
    $25.00 US
    Hardcover
    Everyman's Library
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    V. S. Naipaul
    978-0-375-70716-2
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
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    W. Somerset Maugham
    978-0-375-75315-2
    $14.00 US
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    May 16, 2017
  • The Heart Goes Last
    The Heart Goes Last
    A Novel
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-101-91236-2
    $17.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Aug 09, 2016
  • Dire Cartographies
    Dire Cartographies
    The Roads to Ustopia and The Handmaid's Tale
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-101-97200-7
    $0.99 US
    Ebook
    Anchor
    Sep 08, 2015
  • Stone Mattress
    Stone Mattress
    Nine Wicked Tales
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-8041-7350-6
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Jun 23, 2015
  • MaddAddam
    MaddAddam
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-307-45548-2
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Aug 12, 2014
  • The MaddAddam Trilogy Bundle
    The MaddAddam Trilogy Bundle
    The Year of the Flood; Oryx & Crake; MaddAddam
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-101-87387-8
    $29.99 US
    Ebook
    Anchor
    Aug 12, 2014
  • Moral Disorder: A Story
    Moral Disorder: A Story
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-101-87360-1
    $0.99 US
    Ebook
    Vintage
    Jul 29, 2014
  • In Other Worlds
    In Other Worlds
    SF and the Human Imagination
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-307-74176-9
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Aug 21, 2012
  • Good Bones and Simple Murders
    Good Bones and Simple Murders
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-307-79853-4
    $9.99 US
    Ebook
    Nan A. Talese
    Jun 08, 2011
  • The Year of the Flood
    The Year of the Flood
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-307-45547-5
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Jul 27, 2010
  • Moral Disorder and Other Stories
    Moral Disorder and Other Stories
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-72164-6
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Feb 12, 2008
  • The Tent
    The Tent
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-4000-9701-2
    $14.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    May 08, 2007
  • Oryx and Crake
    Oryx and Crake
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-72167-7
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Mar 30, 2004
  • Negotiating with the Dead
    Negotiating with the Dead
    A Writer on Writing
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-4000-3260-0
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Sep 09, 2003
  • The Blind Assassin
    The Blind Assassin
    A Novel
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-72095-3
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Aug 28, 2001
  • Dancing Girls
    Dancing Girls
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49109-9
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    May 18, 1998
  • Bodily Harm
    Bodily Harm
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49107-5
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Apr 13, 1998
  • Lady Oracle
    Lady Oracle
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49108-2
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Apr 13, 1998
  • Life Before Man
    Life Before Man
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49110-5
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Apr 13, 1998
  • The Handmaid's Tale
    The Handmaid's Tale
    A Novel
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49081-8
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Mar 16, 1998
  • Surfacing
    Surfacing
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49105-1
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Mar 16, 1998
  • The Edible Woman
    The Edible Woman
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49106-8
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Mar 16, 1998
  • Wilderness Tips
    Wilderness Tips
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49111-2
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Mar 16, 1998
  • Cat's Eye
    Cat's Eye
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49102-0
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Jan 20, 1998
  • The Robber Bride
    The Robber Bride
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49103-7
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Jan 20, 1998
  • Bluebeard's Egg
    Bluebeard's Egg
    Stories
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49104-4
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Jan 20, 1998
  • Alias Grace
    Alias Grace
    A Novel
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49044-3
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Oct 13, 1997
  • Old Babes in the Wood
    Old Babes in the Wood
    Stories
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-54907-3
    $30.00 US
    Hardcover
    Doubleday
    Mar 07, 2023
  • Burning Questions
    Burning Questions
    Essays and Occasional Pieces, 2004 to 2021
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-593-55666-5
    $32.00 US
    Large Print
    Random House Large Print
    Mar 08, 2022
  • The Testaments
    The Testaments
    A Novel
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-525-56262-7
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Sep 01, 2020
  • The Handmaid's Tale (Graphic Novel)
    The Handmaid's Tale (Graphic Novel)
    A Novel
    Margaret Atwood, Renee Nault
    978-0-385-53924-1
    $23.95 US
    Hardcover
    Nan A. Talese
    Mar 26, 2019
  • The Bad News
    The Bad News
    From Moral Disorder
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-525-56640-3
    $0.99 US
    Ebook
    Vintage
    Oct 02, 2018
  • Hag-Seed
    Hag-Seed
    William Shakespeare's The Tempest Retold: A Novel
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-8041-4131-4
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Hogarth
    May 16, 2017
  • The Heart Goes Last
    The Heart Goes Last
    A Novel
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-101-91236-2
    $17.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Aug 09, 2016
  • Dire Cartographies
    Dire Cartographies
    The Roads to Ustopia and The Handmaid's Tale
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-101-97200-7
    $0.99 US
    Ebook
    Anchor
    Sep 08, 2015
  • Stone Mattress
    Stone Mattress
    Nine Wicked Tales
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-8041-7350-6
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Jun 23, 2015
  • MaddAddam
    MaddAddam
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-307-45548-2
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Aug 12, 2014
  • The MaddAddam Trilogy Bundle
    The MaddAddam Trilogy Bundle
    The Year of the Flood; Oryx & Crake; MaddAddam
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-101-87387-8
    $29.99 US
    Ebook
    Anchor
    Aug 12, 2014
  • Moral Disorder: A Story
    Moral Disorder: A Story
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-101-87360-1
    $0.99 US
    Ebook
    Vintage
    Jul 29, 2014
  • In Other Worlds
    In Other Worlds
    SF and the Human Imagination
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-307-74176-9
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Aug 21, 2012
  • Good Bones and Simple Murders
    Good Bones and Simple Murders
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-307-79853-4
    $9.99 US
    Ebook
    Nan A. Talese
    Jun 08, 2011
  • The Year of the Flood
    The Year of the Flood
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-307-45547-5
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Jul 27, 2010
  • Moral Disorder and Other Stories
    Moral Disorder and Other Stories
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-72164-6
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Feb 12, 2008
  • The Tent
    The Tent
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-4000-9701-2
    $14.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    May 08, 2007
  • Oryx and Crake
    Oryx and Crake
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-72167-7
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Mar 30, 2004
  • Negotiating with the Dead
    Negotiating with the Dead
    A Writer on Writing
    Margaret Atwood
    978-1-4000-3260-0
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Sep 09, 2003
  • The Blind Assassin
    The Blind Assassin
    A Novel
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-72095-3
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Aug 28, 2001
  • Dancing Girls
    Dancing Girls
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49109-9
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    May 18, 1998
  • Bodily Harm
    Bodily Harm
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49107-5
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Apr 13, 1998
  • Lady Oracle
    Lady Oracle
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49108-2
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Apr 13, 1998
  • Life Before Man
    Life Before Man
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49110-5
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Apr 13, 1998
  • The Handmaid's Tale
    The Handmaid's Tale
    A Novel
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49081-8
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Mar 16, 1998
  • Surfacing
    Surfacing
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49105-1
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Mar 16, 1998
  • The Edible Woman
    The Edible Woman
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49106-8
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Mar 16, 1998
  • Wilderness Tips
    Wilderness Tips
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49111-2
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Mar 16, 1998
  • Cat's Eye
    Cat's Eye
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49102-0
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Jan 20, 1998
  • The Robber Bride
    The Robber Bride
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49103-7
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Jan 20, 1998
  • Bluebeard's Egg
    Bluebeard's Egg
    Stories
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49104-4
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Jan 20, 1998
  • Alias Grace
    Alias Grace
    A Novel
    Margaret Atwood
    978-0-385-49044-3
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Anchor
    Oct 13, 1997
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