In 1985, when Canadian writer Margaret Atwood first released "The Handmaid's Tale", she must not have imagined that her fate would still be closely linked to this fantasy novel exactly 35 years later: in 2019, the English version of the sequel to "The Handmaid's Tale" "Testimony" won the Booker Award, the highest award in the English-language novel industry, as soon as it came out. It was also since then that Chinese readers and fans of dramas have also begun to wait for it to Chinese Simplified edition. Now, here it comes.
Throughout the literary world, film and television circles, there are novels and then film and television dramas, movies, countless; among them, "overturning", or being complained about by book fans, can be described as numerous. But Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale is definitely the best counterexample. To put it simply, the first eye-catching point of "The Handmaid's Tale" is that the brain hole is open enough. Atwood's pen constructs a "Gilead" that belongs to the future world, and fertile women are called "maids", and they are pure reproductive tools. The heroine offred is one of them, and the story of the book revolves between her dealing with the ruler, the ruler's murderous "wife", and the elderly woman "martha" who takes care of the ruler's housework. She wants to survive while finding her daughter who has been taken away.
However, after the birth of the "Handmaid's Tale" novel in 1985, in addition to winning the "Nebula Award" in the United States, which specially awards science fiction and fantasy literature, it has not entered the public eye for more than 30 years. Until 2017, the American drama of the same name was launched, and it became a hit: as of last year, it had come out to the third season, and the word of mouth was all over the line. In the Chinese online world, the Douban score of the three seasons of "The Handmaid's Tale" is not less than 8 points. Because of this, not only did the English version of "The Handmaid's Tale" sell more than 8 million copies, but also the success of the TV series pushed Atwood to write the sequel "Testimony".
The first three seasons of the American drama "The Handmaid's Tale" have gained quite good word-of-mouth, which in turn has boosted the sales of the original novel.
"Dear readers, you have asked me many times about the details of Gilead and its inner workings. These questions became the inspiration for the book. At last year's Launch of the English edition of Testimony, Atwood said so. At the same time, Atwood revealed that the title of "Testimony" has three meanings: last words, testimony, and last words.
The story of the Testimony begins 15 years after the end of The Handmaid's Tale, and the rule of the "Gileads" is rifted from within. At this time, the protagonists in front of Them, Offfred and the Archbishop, completely withdrew from the stage. But two well-known figures remain: Aunt Lydia and Archbishop R. Frederick Judd, who appears in the final chapter of The Handmaid's Tale, "Historical Sources." From the beginning, he believed that "managing women through women is the best and most cost-effective way to achieve fertility or other goals." ”
Structurally, The Testimony is the same as The Handmaid's Tale 35 years ago. The main body of the novel consists of handwritten material discovered by historians a century later; the material itself restates the inside story of the "Gileads" in the first person. And the most important part of the whole testimony story was written by Grandma Lydia by hand. Because only Mamma could read and write in the story, Gilead deprived other women of their right to knowledge. Aunt Lydia recounts how the great upheaval of the "Kingdom of Gilead" took place. Compared with Offred's previous self-description, Aunt Lydia's dictation is more emotional, which can be said to be doubly cruel. Last year, the English version of testimony won the Booker Prize shortly after its release, making Margaret Atwood, 80, the oldest winner in the history of the award.
According to Atwood, the writing of the Testimony took place in many places. In addition to some of the hotel rooms I have stayed in and the coffee shops I have visited, I have also included park benches, deep in the forest, and even in the scenic train cars that have been suspended due to landslides. She also joked that parts of the testimony had been written on napkins printed with proverbs. "Before it was officially written, part of the work of The Testimony was in the minds of readers of its predecessor, The Handmaid's Tale, who kept asking what happened after the novel ended." Atwood says it's a long process to think about what the answer to this question will be in 35 years.
Canadian writer Margaret Atwood (left) shares last year's Booker Prize with British writer Bernard Evaristo for the testimony, the first time in 30 years that two writers have shared the prize.
On October 14, 2019, she won the Booker Prize for the second time for Testimony, the first time for Blind Assassin in 2000.
This year, the third season of the TV series of the same name, based on "The Handmaid's Tale", was released, and the series has swept the Emmy Awards, the Golden Globes and the Critics' Choice Award (known as the Oscar bellwether) in the past three years. Although there was a film of the same name in 1990, it was far less influential than the TV series produced by Hulu this time. Atwood herself also made a cameo appearance in the first season, slapping Offried in the play, obviously a scene written by herself, but she felt particularly terrifying when she performed.
Upstream News Chongqing Morning News reporter Qiu Jinyi
Source: Upstream News Bring together the upward forces