Comparative study of Christina Dalcher’s VOX and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale

Proceedings of ‏The 5th International Conference on New Findings On Humanities and Social Sciences

Year: 2020

DOI: https://www.doi.org/10.33422/5th.hsconf.2020.11.100

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Comparative study of Christina Dalcher’s VOX and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale

Kalina Krivachkova

 

ABSTRACT: 

In the wake of the MeToo movement that is occupying Hollywood and consequently the USA scene, as well as the rise of women’s dystopian novels, has given birth to one more tale of a female protagonist who goes against the odds for her daughter. Christina Dalcher’s Vox very much resembles Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, not only because of the government’s oppression of women and silencing their voices but because it shows how far a woman, a mother, is willing to go in order to ensure a future for her daughter that provides the needed freedom of speech and the repossession of women’s own bodies. This paper provides a comparative study of the two novels, especially in regards to the two female protagonists and the choices they make, as well as their actions to bringing the oppressing regimes to their fall. This paper notes the importance of the female movement, the female voice, how easy it is to lose it, and the willingness to fight off the oppressors as a way to prove oneself worthiness to be part of the active female activism of the past by acting in the present and ensuring the future of the generations to follow.

Keywords: oppression; feminism; activism; dystopia; control.