The Penelopiad

The Myth of Penelope and Odysseus (Myths series) The myths series

by Margaret Atwood

Hardcover, 216 pages

English language

Published Aug. 8, 2005 by Knopf.

ISBN:: 978-0-676-97418-8

View on OpenLibrary

(36 reviews)

35 editions

Stephanie Jane reviewed The Penelopiad (Canons) by Margaret Atwood

Loved Penelope's sense of humour

4 stars

I saw AJ Sterkel's review of The Penelopiad on her blog Read All The Things - ajsterkel.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/review-penelopiad-margaret-atwood.html - back in January 2018 and thought I might enjoy the book, so was then delighted to spot this reissue on NetGalley a few weeks later. I've had a copy of Homer's The Odyssey sitting on my bookshelf for at least a year now awaiting reading. I don't think I've ever actually read the whole book, although I know the gist of several of Odysseus' adventures, and I admit being put off by its 300-odd epic-poem-in-small-print pages. The Penelopiad's relative brevity was far more enticing!

Atwood focusses on what Penelope might have done and felt during the years Odysseus was away firstly at war and then 'lost' on his famous odyssey home, and has Penelope tell us her side of the story from the afterlife where she is still surrounded by many of the people she knew in life. Of one of her Suitors who still hangs around she says: "The man was a pest when he was alive and a pest he remains." Penelope's sense of humour frequently chimed exactly with mine so I appreciated her sarcasm and wry observations. For many years she is effectively a woman abandoned and emotionally alone so, while appearing strong to the outside world, privately she does indulge in an awful lot of weeping - one of the perils of a Naiad mother apparently. Too much water. Penelope is doomed to live in a state of limbo repeatedly hearing rumours of Odysseus' wanderings and minstrel songs of his adventures while never learning when or even if he will return home. I loved the dry interpretations: "Odysseus was the guest of a goddess on an enchanted isle, said some; she had turned his men into pigs - not a hard job in my view - ... no, said others, it was just an expensive whorehouse and he was sponging off the madam." I wasn't so enamoured of the Greek chorus of maids who burst into poetry or song every so often. I understood this inclusion as it is reflective of the original Greek sagas and a good way to advance the plot by several years in a few verses, but it didn't have the humour of the prose chapters. The maids themselves are perhaps the most hard done by, realistically so, in this Odyssey retelling. Abused and ill treated by the horde of Suitors, they are then the ones to face ultimate punishment at the hands of Odysseus and his now-adult son. Atwood researched a variety of sources for The Penelopiad and her interpretations of the maids' gruesome end was very interesting to me. Instead of taking the patriarchal tale at face value, she looks at scant clues remaining to offer a different understanding of their, and Penelope's, true roles. It's an idea I would like to see explored more fully.

Overall, I enjoyed much about The Penelopiad. It did feel a bit too much of an Odyssey summary in places and I think a longer historical novel from Penelope's viewpoint might have been more satisfying, but I liked how Atwood envisaged her and her world. I will now (eventually) go into reading The Odyssey itself from an angle other than the one Homer probably intended

nerd teacher [books] reviewed The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood (The myths series)

Even before she publicly pulled a Rowling, this book would've been a big hint.

1 star

Content warning Long review: Mentions of views that exclude and misrepresent sex workers.

I started reading this book before Atwood decided to publicly pull a Rowling, acting as if the word woman "could no longer be used" because of some transphobic nonsense.

But even before she did that, had I read and finished this book without that context, a lot of conservative views would've been present that I wouldn't have expected based on her older work that I've read.

This book has a lot of in-text slut-shaming, and a lot of it feels like a lot of it is based in frustration of promiscuous women, sex workers, and anyone else who uses sex (or the imagery of sex) for their work. Despite the initial complaint at the beginning that Penelope has been "used to beat other women" into being good and loyal wives (as a sort of "double standard"), Atwood writes a Penelope who maintains a disdain for people who (according to the writing) choose to engage in behaviours that make them more desirable to others.

There's a clear delineation between the "sympathy" (which is questionably written, at best) for the 12 maids who were murdered by Odysseus and Telemachus because their actions were initially about self-preservation (of Penelope and thus themselves) and how Atwood's Penelope views Helen of Troy (who has zero sympathy and rarely ever has a scene that isn't hostile towards her). Atwood writes sympathy for their sexuality because so much of it came as a result of rape and forced prostitution. She portrays the maids in many of the same ways that people assume sex work looks like: trafficked. And the maids very much are because they're stated to be slaves, to have been purchased or stolen from their families, to have been "permissibly" raped by the masters who owned them... but the writing appears to connect their lives to those of sex workers today. Much of the same language exists here that exists in circles that exclude sex workers.

It's gross. It feels gross. This book would've been a big hint that... Atwood has a lot of exclusionary views that refuse to integrate the experience of certain people into her so-called "feminism."

Pentapod reviewed The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood (Myths)

Review of 'The Penelopiad' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Atwood tells the story of The Odyssey from the perspective of Penelope, Odysseus' wife, and the twelve servant maids who were hung when Odysseus returns. Interesting and somewhat grim.

adastra reviewed The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood ((Ulverscroft Large Print Series))

Review of 'The Penelopiad' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Dafuq did I just read? (A typical Atwood book)

otrops reviewed The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood (Myths)

Review of 'The Penelopiad' on 'Storygraph'

4 stars

A fantastic re-imagining of The Odyssey from Penelope's point of view. Atwood is brilliant as always. She cleverly has Penelope retell the story in the underworld. This means Penelope is able to comment not only on ancient Greek culture but on our current cultural oddities as well.