Margaret Atwood says International Women's Day draws attention to the inequalities faced by women around the world.
On 1 February 2020 Galway City and County began its tenure hosting the European Capital of Culture on behalf of the Irish nation. A number of Galway 2020 events celebrate International Women’s Day, including a full moon swim and a public interview with Canadian author, poet and activist Margaret Atwood.
Margaret Atwood’s 1985 novel 'The Handmaid's Tale’ is set in a dystopian version of the future, where the United States of America is taken over by Gilead, a totalitarian, puritanical, patriarchal regime. Imagery from the book is used worldwide by those campaigning for women’s rights.
In 2019, ‘The Testaments’ Margaret Atwood’s much anticipated follow-up to ‘The Handmaid's Tale’ jointly won the prestigious Booker Prize along with Bernadine Evaristo’s ‘Girl, Woman, Other’.
Margaret Atwood feels International Women’s Day is as relevant now as it ever was. It draws attention to the inequalities that still exist around the world.
The television adaptation of ‘The Handmaid's Tale’ began filming in 2016. In November of that year, Donald Trump, the Republican nominee for the 2016 presidential election, became the president-elect of the USA.
We all woke up and said OK we’re in a different show, not that the show changed but the frame around it, the way it was going to be viewed had just abruptly changed.
An RTÉ News report broadcast on 8 March 2020. The reporter is Sinéad Crowley.
