The Handmaid’s Tale - Claire Danes

Written by Claire Danes
Format: MP3

Written by: Margaret Atwood
Narrated by: Claire Danes
Length: 11 hrs

Format: Unabridged

Release Date:07-20-12

Audible Editor Reviews
Why we think it’s Essential - Margaret Atwood’s modern classic is one of the most stunning and powerful works of speculative fiction ever written, and it took a lot of careful consideration to determine who would best narrate this important book. Claire Danes elevates the frightening dystopic vision by lending a sheen of reality with her performance. She doesn’t act, and she doesn’t need to. She recounts. She breathes out the tale as if she is living it. Resigned, beaten down, traveling through hell by putting one step ahead of the other. I was utterly convinced by her performance. —Emily

Publisher’s Summary

Audie Award, Fiction, 2013

Margaret Atwood’s popular dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale explores a broad range of issues relating to power, gender and religious politics. Multiple Golden Globe award-winner Claire Danes (Romeo and Juliet, The Hours) gives a stirring performance of this classic in speculative fiction, one of the most powerful and widely read novels of our time.

After a staged terrorist attack kills the President and most of Congress, the government is deposed and taken over by the oppressive and all controlling Republic of Gilead. Offred, now a Handmaid serving in the household of the enigmatic Commander and his bitter wife, can remember a time when she lived with her husband and daughter and had a job, before she lost even her own name. Despite the danger, Offred learns to navigate the intimate secrets of those who control her every move, risking her life in breaking the rules in hopes of ending this oppression.

The Handmaid’s Tale is part of Audible’s A-List Collection, featuring the world’s most celebrated actors narrating distinguished works of literature that each star had a hand in selecting. For more great books performed by Hollywood’s finest, click here.
What the Critics Say

“Claire Danes sparkles in this performance…Danes’s Offred is complex, and her flashes of intense strength highlight her vulnerability. This is a consuming listen, thanks to Danes’s emotional subtleties.” (AudioFile)
“Not So Far-Fetched — Still Chilling”

Because this has been re-released as an *Audible A-List Collection,* a selection chosen by Clare Danes for narration, I’ll begin with the narration. This is one of the rare cases where a straight reading, sans the voice characterizations and the nuances one would think an actor would use, earns top scores from me. Ms. Danes reads the story with strength and conviction, wisely chosing to let the words of an outstanding poet/author give voice to the characters in this cautionary tale. The feel of this book is dark and dispassionate, a story about a violent new world where feelings and thoughts are prohibited, yet it is at the same time visceral, strong with emotion, because of Atwood’s writing skills, her ironic wit, and superb story-telling abilities — matched perfectly with Danes’ talents.

I was introduced to this book in college. 1985, a women’s rights to her body (i.e. abortion) was a hot topic, feminism was getting its first *report card,* and The Handmaid’s Tale was either being showered with awards and praise, or being pulled from library shelves and crossed off reading lists — a scene straight out of Farenheit 451, another *dystopian* novel where we see that repression of any kind has a price. (Atwood didn’t think her work was sci-fi and argued that this was not science fiction, but rather speculative fiction.) In ‘85 I thought this was chilling and very futuristic.

Dystopian? Future? Speculative? … The world is struggling from the effects (or more accurately the consequences of) of pollution, chemicals, GMO’s, and radiation; our government has been extinguished, world-wide war rages, religious conflicts a large part of the cause; disease and sterility are prevalent, conception and healthy live births atypical; many species have vanished, food is scarce and rationed along with water. The Republic of Gilead (a country established within the borders of the former USA) is a violent male dominated theocracy where women have no power, young women are owned for breeding purposes, sex is a disturbing biblical ritual, the Eyes watch constantly for heretics and dissenters (routinely put to death and openly displayed). …*Dystopian* along the lines of Clockwork Orange,1984, (Stepford Wives?), but more like good *speculation* now in 2012, where burkas, honor killings, or young girls being married off to old coots in polygamist sects are weekly headlines.

The ending of this book is troublesome for those that want a destination, or a wrap-up, as it leaves the reader unsure–left to decide between hope and complete despair. Atwood is a master at interrogating society and having the reader then try to explain it. Definitely one you will think about. Ageless and still chilling in 2012; a wonderfully distrubing tale made even better by Danes’ insightful dead-on interpretation. (Fantastic to have this as a selection–great choice Audible.)
“If I could give the narrator more than 5 stars…”

This was my first Audible “A-list” title, and I was not disappointed. Claire Danes was the perfect choice for this book.

What used to be the United States is now Gilead, a monotheistic regime where women are protected from “too much choice.” Like our real-world foremothers of a few hundred years ago, the women of Gilead cannot earn money, own property, or vote. They have few lifestyle options: governess, domestic, prostitute, mother. Females with “viable ovaries” are drafted as “Handmaids,” surrogate mothers for sterile women of the elite class.

For Offred, the Handmaid of the title, life is a chorus of “not allowed.” No reading, for women may not read. No fraternization, no conversation, no acknowledgement, no unauthorized possessions like hand lotion. Only fear and loneliness remain as Offred spends her days in a grim little room from which anything she could use to kill herself has been removed.

Through it all she’s starving for human interaction, yet terrified that she’ll look in the wrong direction, say a wrong word, and be transferred to the ominous Colonies with the other “UnWomen.” Claire Danes reads matter-of-factly, her emotions understated as if she really is Offred, who must hide all longing and pain to stay alive.

While there are plenty of great narrators to choose from among Audible titles, it’s very infrequent that the performance makes the book this much better. The story is as chilling as it was when the book was published, but Danes’ reading brings out the suffering, the confusion, the “how-did-I-get-to-this-awful-place” feelings in a way that didn’t come out of the printed text.

This definitely goes on the A-list. Recommended for any woman, any mother, anyone at all
“My Top Pick for 2012″

Full disclosure: The Handmaid’s Tale is my favorite book. It is my number one all-time pick among books, having topped my list since I first read it five years ago. So perhaps I came to this audiobook somewhat biased, but in a sense I think my love of the work set me up to be a harsher critic of the audio production. But listening to it served as a total reminder of why it is so incredible.

Last month, when we ran a little editorial feature about the books we were grateful for, I wrote about The Handmaid’s Tale. It makes me grateful for a lot of reasons: I’m grateful to live in this society, in this time period. I’m grateful that my daughter won’t know the kind of oppression so wrenchingly depicted by Margaret Atwood (who is for the record a total genius). And I’m grateful for how totally humbling this book is. No other work of literature is such a complete reminder that we are all just fragments, or moments in time, and we’re all destined to become - if we’re so lucky - mere historical footnotes. The framed narrative Atwood uses (and I won’t elaborate so as not to spoil) really drives this point home.

I was worried that no narrator could live up to my expectations given my belief in the importance of this book. But Claire Danes is just vivid. She doesn’t act, and she doesn’t need to. She recounts. She breathes out the tale as if she is living it. Resigned, beaten down, traveling through hell by putting one step ahead of the other. I was utterly convinced by her performance and have not been able to shut up about it since. Everyone on my team is going to listen to this before I’m through, and I hope everyone who reads this review will too!
“A heartwrenching story read absolutely brilliantly”

This book is a speculative fiction classic. The rise of the Gilead society seems all too plausible in today’s political climate, and Offred’s story is painful in its intensity.

I often find myself disappointed by the narrators of audiobooks, but not so with this one. Claire Danes does an incredible job reading, listening to her is like being inside Offred’s head, and she manages to inject pathos into the story without ever distracting the listener from the true star: the words.

Readings this good of stories this potent are the reason audiobooks exist. If I could give it ten stars I would.

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