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Jan 10, 2012

David rated it:

I was intrigued to read a woman's point of view focused upon one of the great heroines of Homer's "Odyssey" in Penelope. Homer's work is, of course, an epic masterpiece which has endured for more than four milennia and it is nearly impossible to do justice to this legend of incredible, ancient genius. I was disappointed in several places by Atwood's rather shallow depictions of the characters of both Odysseus and Penelope who were both courageous and brilliant in their own ways in Home More...

2 comments like (8 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Daniel rated it:

I'm still trying to figure out why this book didn't settle well with me. Maybe since I'd never read any of Atwood's books, I wasn't properly introduced to her style. Which means that now all I know about her style is that she likes to force a legend as old as civilization itself into a pseudo-feminist statement on post-Reagan American sexism. Which if that's your sort of thing, then fine. This book excels in that regard.

But I guess that whole idea--taking an ancient oral legend f More...

2 comments like (6 people liked it)

Jul 10, 2011

Shellie (Layers of Thought) rated it:

Original review posted at Layers of Thought.

This story is from the perspective of “the other” - a marginalized female character in the myth. It is told in the first person by Penelope, wife of Odysseus and cousin to Helen of Troy.

Interestingly Atwood tells this in an usual and layered way. Penelope is in Hades as she tell the story and pieces are conveyed in poem format at the beginning of each chapter, from the perspective of Penelope's 12 maids. These maids are sacrifi More...

4 comments like (4 people liked it)

Jan 07, 2008

Elizabeth rated it:

I'm a sucker for Odysseus, as many of you know (once I finish gawain's daughter, I'm planning on writing the Telemakhiad, for example), so I appreciate that this doesn't make him a villian, a wife-beater or somesuch.

There are some excellent moments -- the opening line is brilliant ('Now that I'm dead I know everything'); and the wordplay throughout is superb; the 'gilded blood pudding' simile (trust me, it's good); the relationship between the maids and Telemakhos (although she doesn More...

1 comment like (8 people liked it)

Jul 13, 2007

Res rated it:

The one where Penelope tells her story from the Underworld. I made it about sixty pages before the whining got to me.

Presumably the author feels that Penelope deserves better than to be a secondary character. But since, when put on center stage, this universal-victim Penelope never asserts herself, and is chiefly worried about whether people like her and how she's not as pretty as Helen of Troy, I'd say the Odyssey did her a better turn than Atwood did.

0 comments like (6 people liked it)

May 16, 2008

Alexis rated it:

I have always been fascinated by Penelope and my fascination only grew after reading Ben Ehrenreich's contemporary retelling of The Odyssey<i/>, The Suitors<i/>, which focuses on Penelope and her suitors (in Ehrenreich's tale the suitors are both men and women and there are no female servants). I also appreciate the "myths" series from Canongate, of which The Penelopiad<i/> is one, although I have not read nearly as many of them as I would like.

I enjoyed More...

3 comments like (1 person liked it)

Mar 11, 2008

Sharon rated it:

This slight book is a pleasure. I learned of it through TwitterLit, which sends out the first sentence of books. The first sentence of this one--"Now that I'm dead I know everything."--is contradicted in the next sentence and throughout the book. What we know of Odysseus from Homer is not contradicted but questioned as Penelope recounts her story. And, since she says that both she and Odysseus are "proficient and shameless liars," we are clearly meant to question what we More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jun 29, 2007

katie rated it:

I tried. I know no one's going to believe me, but I tried to like this, I swear. I didn't, though. Frankly, the fact that I made it through the book is an accomplishment.

I guess it's a classic Margaret Atwood theme that women are mean to each other. And I guess, it's an indictment? That if it's bad when men treat women poorly (and it is), that it's utterly inforgivable when women treat other women poorly. But, I don't know that shoving that theme onto these characters serves anyone v More...

1 comment like (3 people liked it)

Apr 27, 2008

Teresa rated it:

Margaret Atwood has a brilliant mind, and I think this book is a brilliant way to start the Canongate Myth series: with a story that illustrates the various ways a myth can be interpreted.

Who is telling the truth? Is there only one truth? If so, can it be known? This may seem like a slight read, but underneath it has a lot to say about these questions, about the nature of silence and storytelling itself, including unexpected danger when perhaps you think you've got everything cove

2 comments like (4 people liked it)

Mar 07, 2008

Michelle rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

0 comments like (5 people liked it)

Jun 12, 2008

Selena rated it:

I really enjoyed this book, I think the whole idea of the myth series is fantastic and I am totally in support, even if I don't love every book that will come out of it.

This is a retelling of the story of The Odyssey from the perspective of Penelope, the wife left behind during Odysseus's twenty years of adventure and intrigue. Atwood hypothesises that the limited attention that Penelope and her plight gets in most tellings of the story is due to the patriarchal structure marginaliz More...

1 comment like (2 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Siria rated it:

At only 196 pages in the hardback version, this is hardly the lengthiest of Atwood's work; it's still one of her most insightful, and her most enjoyable. It hit several of my favourite story-telling kinks--the relationships between story-telling and truth, myth and history and the role of women--and for something which is so slim a work, there is an awful lot to unpack in it.

I wasn't perhaps entirely sure of the prose used for Penelope's voice--what she was saying seemed very true fo More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Nov 18, 2008

Felicity rated it:

A very quick read; the inverse of an epic. Atwood writes a rueful and human Penelope, undercutting here and there the heroism of The Odyssey, and undercuts her in her turn with the sharp-tongued Greek Chorus of angry, dead maids. It is partially this interplay -- chapters of Penelope's memories against highly varied poems, songs and prose excerpts from the 'chorusline' of Maids -- that makes it so easy to read the book at a few sittings. Getting two sides of the same story is interesting and ad More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

May 18, 2011

Kristin rated it:

It's been four years since I read it, but I still remember my distaste for this book. It was my first introduction to Atwood, and (sadly) it put me off her for two more years. I read the entire book in one two hour setting (I skipped the songs). Overall, I think I was just really disappointed; I had just finished reading The Odyssey, and I was super excited when I heard that this book had been published. I just found it boring; I couldn't feel sympathetic towards Penelope, I really couldn't get More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jun 24, 2007

Nathalie rated it:

"Der, my name is Margaret Atwood, I know I'm being totally anachronistic and completely missing the point of mythological scholarship but I am going to use one of the two greatest works of Western literature to push my simplistic, narrow-minded, knee-jerk feminist agenda. I mean, obviously its impossible to study ancient texts through a feminist lens and see anything other than chauvinist misogyny and abuse of authority, right? Imposing my own standards of justice on an ancient, alien and More...

2 comments like (3 people liked it)

Feb 17, 2008

Shan rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 12, 2008

Sarah_novak rated it:

This is not a retelling from the wife's perspective. Instead it is Penelope's story, as well as the story of the other women 'left behind.' What is lovely/wonderful about the book is that it takes the time to remind us that the whole point of these stories is that they were meant to be told not just written down and read. So as with all the stories we tell/tell ourselves there are about a million and four different versions and each one has some truth and some not so much truth to it.
I've More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 25, 2007

Savannah rated it:

Margaret Atwood is one of my very favorite authors so I make it a habit to devour every single one of her books that I can find at the library. I picked this book up because I needed something short and light to read during the last week of class last term and was slightly disappointed. I think Atwood does so much better when she has full control of the story she is telling. Re-telling a myth doesn't allow her to do her wonderful twists and turns. Her voice is still there but some parts feel lik More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Jan 21, 2009

Gayle rated it:

The story of the Odyssey is the story of the hero Odysseus and his lengthy travels following the Trojan war, as he tries to hurry home to his long-suffering wife Penelope. This book, written by Margaret Atwood, tells her story.

Good things: it's short. It has an interesting point of view: Penelope in the 21st century, long dead and accustomed to the realm of the afterlife. She has a wry and somewhat disgruntled voice, and the story is well told.

Not-as-good things: the maid More...

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Dec 28, 2008

Madeline rated it:

Often I amuse myself by trying to imagine the ideas, conversations, or circumstances that led to the writing of certain books. For example, I think Philippa Gregory wrote The Other Boleyn Girl because she wanted to write a smutty romance novel disguised as history, Shakespeare probably wrote The Taming of the Shrew because someone bet him he couldn't write a play where domestic abuse is interpreted as matrimonial devotion, and Bette Green wrote Summer of My German Soldier specifically to torture More...

0 comments like (4 people liked it)

Feb 06, 2012

Trendhater73 rated it:

I really wanted to like this one. Ever since I heard about it I wanted to read it. The anticipation may have been too much. Not to mention all of the hype that my pofessors and classmates were always dishing out. Everyone told me that I would love this book and I thought they were right, because Margaret Atwood is a genius and I love her work.

This story was not bad, it was just rushed and lacking in detail. I was surprised to find that _The Odyssey_ contained much more detail than t More...

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Feb 05, 2012

Laura rated it:

I absolutely loved this book - adored it, even. I literally couldn't put it down and finished it in one 90 minute sitting!

I love historical fiction, particularly that set in Ancient Greek and Roman times - there's something about the talk of gods and goddesses, sex, love, greed, war and power in those settings that just lures me in.

I've not fully read Homer's Odyssey or The Iliad, only parts (though I have copies of both at home waiting to be completed) but (like many, I More...

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Jan 16, 2012

Lo rated it:

This book combined many of my favorite things in life: greek mythology, Margaret Atwood, and Penelope (the wise and determined wife of Odysseus). However, it fell just a little short of my expectations.

Atwood chronicles the life of Penelope as a largely powerless woman, who dwells on her jealousy of her cousin Helen and the death of her twelve maids. The Penelopiad focuses on the life (in respect to Penelope) of these maids and their untimely and unfortunate end at the hands of Odyss More...

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Oct 24, 2011

Beth rated it:

The Penelopiad is a fantastically entertaining novel, so immersive, with such a warm and witty voice from Penelope, long-suffering wife of Odysseus. However, of all the women of Greek tragedy, I found Penelope's story a little...slight. For all its cleverness, humour and imagination, it was just a little too whimsical to resonate the way a 4 or 5-star book would have.

It must be said that I love feminist novels that aren't all in your face about it. I love novels like Beloved that sh More...

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Jul 13, 2011

Holly rated it:

Most people know about the tale of Odysseus - how he was at sea for 20 years and how his ever-faithful wife, Penelope, waited patiently for his return, how she fooled many suitors with her weaving and how she remained faithful to the hope that Odysseus would someday return. This myth is almost always told from Odysseus' point of view, as his is the more exciting tale: his adventures are legendary, after all. However, this retelling is told from Penelope's point of view: was she really the happy More...

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Mar 31, 2011

Alexis rated it:

This is the story of Penelope and Odysseus but told from the point of view of Penelope. Not only is Penelope telling the story but she tells the story (with special appearance by the twelve dead maids) from the underworld using wit and dry humor.

The big question revolves around the inexplicable hanging of Queen Penelope's 12 young handmaidens and her unsuccessful suitors. This question is not answered in the Odyssey but Queen Penelope has lots of thoughts about the matter and they More...

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Nov 04, 2010

Christopher rated it:

At just under two-hundred pages, I read this novella in one sitting, and enjoyed it immensely! Also, having just finished reading Robert Fagles' marvelous translation of Homer's The Odyssey, finding and reading The Penelopiad seemed more than serendipitous. This is a retelling of The Odyssey from the perspective of Odysseus's wife, the 'patient' Penelope. Atwood uses humor, pathos, and a significant dose of imagination and creativity to tell the story of Penelope and the twelve maids. With o More...

2 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 03, 2010

Emily rated it:

Sometimes you just need to read a short book. When I ordered this book on paperbackswap I didn't think much about how it would fit into my schedule, but when it came in the mail and I saw how short it was, I could not have been more happy. The life of a student is very hectic in November, and this little novella fit in between the research papers and concert preparations just perfectly.

This novella by Margaret Atwood is the story of the Odyssey from the perspective of Penelope. In the More...

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Aug 24, 2010

Sue rated it:

The Penelopiad is a model of cleverness. Margaret Atwood wanted to investigate the faithful wife of Odysseus, and it’s an admirable goal – in view of the Greeks’ patriarchal practice of ignoring women as beings with any complexity. So in this slim volume, she turned the story of Odysseus upside down and waited by Penelope’s side for the wandering warrior to return.

Here is Margaret Atwood’s summation of her intent:

“I’ve chosen to give the telling of the story to Penelope More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

May 10, 2010

Andrea rated it:

While Odysseus was gallivanting about the ancient world, fighting in the Trojan War, outsmarting monsters, and bedding Goddesses, his wife, Penelope, stayed home and waited. This is her story--and the story of the twelve maids that Odysseus told Telemachus to murder when he returned to Ithaca.

The Penelopiad is primarily told in Penelope's voice and the voices of her maids speaking in a chorus. They tell their stories from the underworld, where they have resided for millenia. The More...

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