Story of Handmaid’s Tale becoming ‘more and more plausible’

The book tells the story of subjugated women called handmaids who are forced to be natal slaves.

Award-winning author Margaret Atwood has said the events depicted in her book The Handmaid’s Tale, which tells the story of an authoritarian regime, are becoming “more and more plausible”.

The Canadian writer, 86, published the futuristic novel in 1985 and followed it up with Booker Prize-winning story The Testaments in 2019, both of which inspired the dystopian TV series starring US actress Elisabeth Moss.

In the book, the US is replaced by a theocratic, totalitarian regime called the Republic of Gilead which has subjugated women, many of whom are forced to be natal slaves called handmaids, tasked with rebuilding the species amid worldwide infertility.

Atwood thought the plot was “bonkers”