Strained Discourses between the Patriarchal Society and the Matriarchal Society in Margaret Atwood’s novel The Handmaid's Tale Rumana Chowdhury Assistant Professor Department of English Language and Literature Premier University Chattogram. Email: chy.rmn@gmail.com Abstract Margaret Atwood, the famous Canadian author describes the contemporary society of New England through her renowned novel The Handmaid's Tale. Here she explores the work and function of the handmaids through some female characters. The protagonist, named Offred is assigned to do her work for the high-class soldiers. Being a mother, as a handmaid she has to leave her child and husband and is forced to do the work for the Gilead society. Offred's character comes out through her work, dialogue, recalling of past life, and description of the present situation. While narrating her character, the writer describes both male and female characters who represent the society. At the same time, the characters of this novel reveal two dominant societies during that time: patriarchal society and matriarchal society. This paper brings out the strained discourses between these two societies of New England by analyzing the characters. At the same time, my purpose is to show that the females always struggle hard for living purpose in so many ways, but ultimately their condition never improves because of the dominating patriarchal society. Keywords: Patriarchal society, Matriarchal society, Handmaid, Discourse, New England