Abstract:

This paper examines the feminist testimonial depiction of patriarchy and fundamentalism in The Handmaid's Tale (1985) by the Canadian writer Margaret Atwood and Reading Lolita in Tehran (2004) by the Iranian writer Azar Nafisi. Each book possesses its own narrative conventions of space, time, and character. While The Handmaid's Tale is a feminist dystopia which imagines a future United States governed by a totalitarian theocracy, Reading Lolita in Tehran is a realistic account of a university professor about her life during the fundamentalist revolution in The Republic of Iran. What these apparently two disparate texts have in common is that they attack patriarchy in all its forms, giving testimonial voice to the otherwise voiceless, with hope of promoting political change in contemporary societies. This paper incorporates diverse ideas about dystopian literature, testimony, and feminist criticism. Key words: dystopia, fundamentalism, testimony, feminist theory, Margret Atwood, Azar Nafisi