Psychoanalytic Interpretations of Envy in the Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood

Abstract: This article examines Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale (1985) through a psychoanalytic and feminist lens, focusing on the dynamics of gender envy as a structuring force within the totalitarian society of Gilead. Employing Sigmund Freud’s theory of penis envy and Karen Horney’s revision of womb envy, the study explores how Atwood’s speculative fiction transforms these psychoanalytic concepts into a political and cultural critique of patriarchy. It argues that Atwood exposes envy not merely as an individual emotion but as a systemic mechanism that regulates gender relations, sustains power hierarchies, and fractures female solidarity. By institutionalizing reproduction, Gilead exemplifies male womb envy—the unconscious desire to appropriate and control women’s generative power through ritualized sexuality, surveillance, and linguistic domination, a reflection of vertical envy. At the same time, horizontal envy circulates among women, manifesting in the rivalry between Wives, Handmaids, and Marthas, whose mutual hostility perpetuates patriarchal control. Through theoretical insights from Luce Irigaray, Hélène Cixous, and Julia Kristeva, the analysis reinterprets envy as a textual and symbolic force within Atwood’s ustopia—a hybrid of utopia and dystopia—where female identity is fragmented and defined through opposition. Ultimately, the article argues that The Handmaid’s Tale dramatizes envy as both a psychic symptom of gendered repression and a sociopolitical tool of domination, revealing how patriarchal structures convert reproductive and creative power into instruments of control. Atwood portrays envy as both the consequence and the sustaining principle of oppression.