The Handmaid's Tale

by Margaret Atwood

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.

But remember that forgiveness too is a power. To beg for it is a power, and to withhold or bestow it is a power, perhaps the greatest.

Live in the present, make the most of it, it’s all you’ve got.

I’ll take care of it, Luke said. And because he said it instead of her, I knew he meant kill. That is what you have to do before you kill, I thought. You have to create an it, where none was before. You do that first, in your head, and then you make it real.

You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs, is what he says. We thought we could do better.

Better never means better for everyone, he says. It always means worse, for some.

But people will do anything rather than admit that their lives have no meaning. No use, that is. No plot.

There is something powerful in the whispering of obscenities, about those in power. There’s something delightful about it, something naughty, secretive, forbidden, thrilling. It’s like a spell, of sorts. It deflates them, reduces them to the common denominator where they can be dealt with.