The Penelopiad

Talking about Penelope brings me to the Penelopiad. This book could have been more accurately called the Trial of Odysseus.

Odysseus here feels like an ancient Andrew Tate. Picture the ancient soap opera: Penelope, the ever dutiful, saintly wife, is left holding the fort while Odysseus sails off on a ten-year vacation fighting the Trojan War, followed by another decade of epic escapades and sexscapades.

And meanwhile Penelope is using her twelve maids to let themselves be used and abused by her suitors to buy time till Odysseus returns. Well, the suitors are killed, naturally. But the maids…Honor killing is… show more.

Margaret Atwood’s feisty, feminist tale is told from the perspective of a demi-goddess, Penelope, who has been abandoned for ten years while her husband, Odysseus, has gone off to the Trojan War.

Unable to manage the loneliness and grief, Atwood suggests that Penelope, as a descendent of the Moon Goddess, started a cult with twelve priestesses who sing to her and worship Artemis. Atwood’s short and engaging novella gives us a new perspective on how women of ancient times created their own realities and centers of feminine power.

On a personal note, Atwood reminds us that as women today, we… show more.

This is a must-read for lovers of The Odyssey. From the viewpoint of the loyal wife, Penelope, we see her early life, her marriage to Odysseus, her life in Ithaca, the trick played by Palamedes to force Odysseus to go to war, and her painful separation from her husband that lasts not a year or two but twenty years. Deceased when she narrates her story, in the Underworld she confronts the worst of the suitors and also Helen. And she shows her compassion for the twelve maidservants hung for taking suitors as lovers. She really believes Odysseus wants to… show more.

This book had to be high up on my list because it’s the book that really inspired my own writing! I first read it during my PhD in Classics at Yale, and I was immediately captivated by it – both the premise (retelling the Odyssey from Penelope’s point of view) and Atwood’s brilliantly laconic, first-person narration. It’s both witty, clever, and complex – you want to read and re-read it just to unravel all the different layers as you begin to discover the different angles Atwood has on Odysseus’ fantastic tale. Also, written in 2005, this book really was way… show more.

In Margaret Atwood’s The Penelopiad the author does what I love best: She breathes life into an ancient story and tells it from an unfamiliar point of view. 

In The Penelopiad, we hear the ancient story of the Odyssey – told not by its boastful hero, Odysseyus –  but by his long-suffering wife, Penelope. Breaking her silence of thousands of years, and accompanied by her twelve maids, she tells us about her less-than-faithful husband, and what his exploits during the Trojan War cost her. 

The hitherto silent Penelope is clever, witty, and wildly entertaining. Her voice is clear,… show more.