I know only a few factoids that I didn’t know before. This is what I wished would happen, but like so many of my wishes it failed to come true.
I’ve always been haunted by the hanged maids and, in The Penelopiad, so is Penelope herself. The maids form a chanting and singing Chorus which focuses on two questions that must pose themselves after any close reading of The Odyssey: what led to the hanging of the maids, and what was Penelope really up to? The story as told in The Odyssey doesn’t hold water: there are too many inconsistencies. I’ve chosen to give the telling of the story to Penelope and to the twelve hanged maids. I have drawn on material other than The Odyssey, especially for the details of Penelope’s parentage, her early life and marriage, and the scandalous rumours circulating about her. Mythic material was originally oral, and also local a myth would be told one way in one place and quite differently in another. The book draws to an end with the slaughter of the Suitors by Odysseus and Telemachus, the hanging of twelve of the maids who have been sleeping with the Suitors, and the reunion of Odysseus and Penelope.īut Homer’s Odyssey is not the only version of the story. Part of The Odyssey concerns her problems with her teenaged son, Telemachus, who is bent on asserting himself not only against the troublesome and dangerous Suitors, but against his mother as well. Not only does Penelope lead them on with false promises, she weaves a shroud that she unravels at night, delaying her marriage decision until its completion. In addition to weeping and praying for the return of Odysseus, she cleverly deceives the many Suitors who are swarming around her palace, eating up Odysseus’ estate in an attempt to force her to marry one of them. In The Odyssey, Penelope-daughter of Icarius of Sparta, and cousin of the beautiful Helen of Troy-is portrayed as the quintessential faithful wife, a woman known for her intelligence and constancy. His divine helper is Pallas Athene, a goddess who admires Odysseus for his ready inventiveness. The character of ‘wily Odysseus’ has been much commented on: he’s noted as a persuasive liar and disguise artist a man who lives by his wits, who devises stratagems and tricks, and who is sometimes too clever for his own good. Odysseus is said to have spent half of these years fighting the Trojan War and the other half wandering around the Aegean Sea, trying to get home, enduring hardships, conquering or evading monsters, and sleeping with goddesses. The story of Odysseus’ return to his home kingdom of Ithaca following an absence of twenty years is best known from Homer’s Odyssey. For a little while their feet twitched, but not for very long. so the women’s heads were held fast in a row, with nooses round their necks, to bring them to the most pitiable end. As when long-winged thrushes or doves get entangled in a snare. he took a cable which had seen service on a blue-bowed ship, made one end fast to a high column in the portico, and threw the other over the round-house, high up, so that their feet would not touch the ground. Shrewd Odysseus!.You are a fortunate man to have won a wife of such pre-eminent virtue! How faithful was your flawless Penelope, Icarius’ daughter! How loyally she kept the memory of the husband of her youth! The glory of her virtue will not fade with the years, but the deathless gods themselves will make a beautiful song for mortal ears in honour of the constant Penelope.’
#Like getting kicked in the head by the chorus line series
Authors in the series include Chinua Achebe, Margaret Atwood, Karen Armstrong, AS Byatt, David Grossman, Milton Hatoum, Victor Pelevin, Donna Tartt, Su Tong and Jeanette Winterson. The Myths series brings together some of the world’s finest writers, each of whom has retold a myth in a contemporary and memorable way. Myths are universal and timeless stories that reflect and shape our lives-they explore our desires, our fears, our longings, and provide narratives that remind us what it means to be human.
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