„THE HANDMAID’S TALE” de Margaret Atwood

Nu că ar fi motiv de mîndrie, dar trebuie să vă spun că țara noastră este menționată în romanul lui Margaret Atwood „The handmaid’s tale”, datorită legii din 1967 care interzicea avorturile.

În ultimul capitol al cărții, istoricii reuniți în cadrul conferinței „Twelfth Symposium on Gileadean Studies” discută autenticitatea manuscrisului găsit „The handmaid’s tale” și motivele care au stat la baza formării societății Gilead.

„The reason for this decline are not altogether clear to us. Some of the failure to reproduce can undoubtedly be traced to the widespread availability of birth control of various kinds, including abortion, in the immediate pre-Gilead period.

Need I remind you that this was the age of the R-strain syphilis and also of the infamous AIDS epidemic, which, once they spread to the population at large, eliminated many young sexually active people from the reproductive pool? Stillbirths, miscarriages, and genetic deformities were widespread and on the increase, and this trend has been linked to the various nuclear-plant accidents…and to the uncontrolled use of chemical insecticides, herbicides, and other sprays.

But whatever the causes, the effects were noticeable, and the Gilead regime was not the only one to react to them at the time. Rumania (sic!), for instance, had anticipated Gilead in the eighties by banning all forms of birth control, imposing compulsory pregnancy tests on the female population, and linking promotion and wage increases to fertility.”

Kindle, 2018