Passage 089 · 1985
"The Handmaid's Tale"
Main effectThrough tense uncertainty, rhetorical questioning of idiom, and syntactic reversal of rising/falling, Atwood creates grammar of resistance—language that questions even basic metaphors, refusing to accept conventional descriptions of reality.
Device index
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Tropes
Self-correction.
Question not requiring answer.
Schemes
Balanced opposition.
Syntax
"Night falls"—subject-verb, simple present. Syntax uses conventional metaphor.
"Or has fallen"—present perfect suggests completion at unspecified time. Syntax introduces temporal uncertainty.
"Why is it that night falls"—cleft sentence in interrogative form. Syntax foregrounds the question, making familiar phrase strange.
"Yet if you look east"—conditional clause introduced by adversative. Syntax pivots from question to observation that contradicts convention.
"darkness lifting into the sky, up from the horizon"—present participle with directional prepositionals. Syntax reverses expected downward motion.
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Intransitive Verb
"Night falls"—subject-verb, simple present. Syntax uses conventional metaphor.
Perfect Tense Correction
"Or has fallen"—present perfect suggests completion at unspecified time. Syntax introduces temporal uncertainty.
Interrogative Why
"Why is it that night falls"—cleft sentence in interrogative form. Syntax foregrounds the question, making familiar phrase strange.
Adversative Yet
"Yet if you look east"—conditional clause introduced by adversative. Syntax pivots from question to observation that contradicts convention.
Participial Reversal
"darkness lifting into the sky, up from the horizon"—present participle with directional prepositionals. Syntax reverses expected downward motion.
Stylistic Effect
Through tense uncertainty, rhetorical questioning of idiom, and syntactic reversal of rising/falling, Atwood creates grammar of resistance—language that questions even basic metaphors, refusing to accept conventional descriptions of reality.