Penelopiad Blog Post 1
Penelopiad, by Margaret Atwood
The essay Penelopiad is Margaret Atwood's rendition of the historic Greek epic The Odyssey, and she retells the piece of mythology in an attempt to fulfill her own personal questions about the plot. There was little explanation or reasoning for many of the storylines in The Odyssey, which inspires Atwood to connect and build the epic to be structurally sound.
It is interesting to analyze this retelling because of the fact that Margaret Atwood is already an established author, and she carries a recognizable persona in her publications. There are common messages that appear in her writing, which often revolves around women's rights. Therefore, her decision to write from the point of view of Penelope is not entirely surprising, as she is giving a voice to a female character in a time period that did not acknowledge or discuss the rights of many groups of people. Yet this also creates confusion for the inspiration behind Penelopiad, as there are few instances in which characters will have the opportunity to acknowledge and critique the system. The question is, does Atwood's feminist lens seem to dilute or overshadow the actual intentions of the story—or is it necessary for the point she is trying to make?
Atwood makes a crucial decision to write from the afterlife, so that Penelope actually has some level of knowledge about the modern world. In this way the author understands that there is simply no platform in the ancient history that allowed any analysis of The Odyssey, in both the plot and of the inequality. In her version, Atwood utilizes the social and legal climate to answer her own questions about the original, and yet does so in a way that contrasts this ancient system with the modern one. The first person perspective is helpful in characterizing Penelope's opinions of the modern world, so that she is able to recognize circumstances in her life that would be viewed much differently now. This decision to use the afterlife is essential in order to successfully apply a feminist lens to a retelling of The Odyssey. Otherwise, historically her retelling would be woefully inaccurate and attempt to rewrite the classic to include concepts that had not existed at it's inception.
It is interesting to analyze this retelling because of the fact that Margaret Atwood is already an established author, and she carries a recognizable persona in her publications. There are common messages that appear in her writing, which often revolves around women's rights. Therefore, her decision to write from the point of view of Penelope is not entirely surprising, as she is giving a voice to a female character in a time period that did not acknowledge or discuss the rights of many groups of people. Yet this also creates confusion for the inspiration behind Penelopiad, as there are few instances in which characters will have the opportunity to acknowledge and critique the system. The question is, does Atwood's feminist lens seem to dilute or overshadow the actual intentions of the story—or is it necessary for the point she is trying to make?
Atwood makes a crucial decision to write from the afterlife, so that Penelope actually has some level of knowledge about the modern world. In this way the author understands that there is simply no platform in the ancient history that allowed any analysis of The Odyssey, in both the plot and of the inequality. In her version, Atwood utilizes the social and legal climate to answer her own questions about the original, and yet does so in a way that contrasts this ancient system with the modern one. The first person perspective is helpful in characterizing Penelope's opinions of the modern world, so that she is able to recognize circumstances in her life that would be viewed much differently now. This decision to use the afterlife is essential in order to successfully apply a feminist lens to a retelling of The Odyssey. Otherwise, historically her retelling would be woefully inaccurate and attempt to rewrite the classic to include concepts that had not existed at it's inception.
Phenomenal blog post Bailey! I made similar points in my blog post! I agree with your point that Atwood's feminist approach could be unreliable in terms of diluting the actual story! I also agree that the essay appears to be more of a means to relay her feminist values rather than the telling of a story! I thought it was interesting how in your last paragraph you talked about the author's decision to write from the afterlife! I also agree that this was an interesting decision and, if I may add, I believe that this philosophical concept was part of her inspiration in writing the Penelopiad! Thank you so much for writing this Bailey - it really enlightened me!!!
ReplyDeleteGrammar/Edits: Analyzation --> Analysis
I enjoy your perspetcive of the novel as a whole and your thought-provoking questions as to whether the feminist lens is being overrused or included enough to add significance to the novel. I appreciate your extensive background knowledge of the fact that Atwood could have recieved her inspiration for the novel from common messages that revolve around women's rights. I agree that the decision to use the afterlife is essential in order to apply the feminist lense to The Odyssey; however, I would like to hear more of your opinion on if the feminist lens is being overrused and overshadowing the central focus of the novel, or if it only enhances the reading as a whole? I think this is a very important question that you adressed and should be examined further, as I too, was thinking as I was reading, that the feminist lens appeared more dominated than neccessary.
ReplyDeleteThis is my favorite blog post of all time, Bailey. The points you made about Margaret Atwood giving a voice to the underrepresented (arguably not represented at all) feminine perspective in The Penelopiad were particularly interesting. To the question you raised about the potential danger of Atwood overshadowing the events and possible intent of the original story by spinning her own narrative, I might refer to literary critic Harold Bloom’s term “strong misreading”. This defines a situation writers find themselves in often, in which the existing literary content created by past authors fills too much space in the creative realm, or the new author sees potential to give new perspective to old works and ideas. So, writers can “strongly misread”, or deliberately misinterpret existing texts in order to make new space for their own ideas and perspectives. I think this logic can be applied to Atwood’s work here. Instead of diluting or overshadowing Homer’s original text, she makes sure The Iliad remains intact in history by adding to it, deliberately misreading it in order to create space for Penelope’s story to develop.
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