The Penelopiad

by Margaret Atwood

  But we did.

  Or so we told each other.

  No sooner had Odysseus returned than he left again. He said that, much as he hated to tear himself away from me, he'd have to go adventuring again. He'd been told by the spirit of the seer Teiresias that he would have to purify himself by carrying an oar so far inland that the people there would mistake it for a winnowing fan. Only in that way could he rinse the blood of the Suitors from himself, avoid their vengeful ghosts and their vengeful relatives, and pacify the anger of the sea-god Poseidon, who was still furious with him for blinding his son the Cyclops.

  It was a likely story. But then, all of his stories were likely.

  xxvi

  The Chorus Line: The Trial of Odysseus, as Videotaped by the Maids

  Attorney for the Defence: Your Honour, permit me to speak to the innocence of my client, Odysseus, a legendary hero of high repute, who stands before you accused of multiple murders. Was he or was he not justified in slaughtering, by means of arrows and spears - we do not dispute the slaughters themselves, or the weapons in question - upwards of a hundred and twenty well-born young men, give or take a dozen, who, I must emphasise, had been eating up his food without his permission, annoying his wife, and plotting to murder his son and usurp his throne? It has been alleged by my respected colleague that Odysseus was not so justified, since murdering these young men was a gross overreaction to the fact of their having played the gourmand a little too freely in his palace.

  Also, it is alleged that Odysseus and/or his heirs or assigns had been offered material compensation for the missing comestibles, and ought to have accepted this compensation peacefully. But this compensation was offered by the very same young men who, despite many requests, had done nothing previously to curb their remarkable appetites, or to defend Odysseus, or to protect his family. They had shown no loyalty to him in his absence; on the contrary. So how dependable was their word? Could a reasonable man expect that they would ever pay a single ox of what they had promised?

  And let us consider the odds. A hundred and twenty, give or take a dozen, to one, or - stretching a point - to four, because Odysseus did have accomplices, as my colleague has termed them; that is, he had one barely grown relative and two servants untrained in warfare - what was to prevent these young men from pretending to enter into a settlement with Odysseus, then leaping upon him one dark night when his guard was down and doing him to death? It is our contention that, by seizing the only opportunity Fate was likely to afford him, our generally esteemed client Odysseus was merely acting in self-defence. We therefore ask that you dismiss this case.

  Judge: I am inclined to agree.

  Attorney for the Defence: Thank you, Your Honour.

  Judge: What's that commotion in the back? Order! Ladies, stop making a spectacle of yourselves! Adjust your clothing! Take those ropes off your necks! Sit down!

  The Maids: You've forgotten about us! What about our case? You can't let him off! He hanged us in cold blood! Twelve of us! Twelve young girls! For nothing!

  Judge (to Attorney for the Defence): This is a new charge. Strictly speaking, it ought to be dealt with in a separate trial; but as the two matters appear to be intimately connected, I am prepared to hear arguments now. What do you have to say for your client?

  Attorney for the Defence: He was acting within his rights, Your Honour. These were his slaves.

  Judge: Nonetheless he must have had some reason. Even slaves ought not to be killed at whim. What had these girls done that they deserved hanging?

  Attorney for the Defence: They'd had sex without permission.

  Judge: Hmm. I see. With whom did they have the sex?

  Attorney for the Defence: With my client's enemies, Your Honour. The very ones who had designs on his wife, not to mention his life.

  (Chuckles at his witticism.)

  Judge: I take it these were the youngest maids.

  Attorney for the Defence: Well, naturally. They were the best-looking and the most beddable, certainly. For the most part.

  The Maids laugh bitterly.

  Judge (leafing through book: The Odyssey): It's written here, in this book - a book we must needs consult, as it is the main authority on the subject - although it has pronounced unethical tendencies and contains far too much sex and violence, in my opinion - it says right here - let me see - in Book 22, that the maids were raped. The Suitors raped them. Nobody stopped them from doing so. Also, the maids are described as having been hauled around by the Suitors for their foul and/or disgusting purposes. Your client knew all that - he is quoted as having said these things himself. Therefore, the maids were overpowered, and they were also completely unprotected. Is that correct?

  Attorney for the Defence: I wasn't there, Your Honour. All of this took place some three or four thousand years before my time.

  Judge: I can see the problem. Call the witness Penelope.

  Penelope: I was asleep, Your Honour. I was often asleep. I can only tell you what they said afterwards.

  Judge: What who said?

  Penelope: The maids, Your Honour.

  Judge: They said they'd been raped?

  Penelope: Well, yes, Your Honour. In effect.

  Judge: And did you believe them?

  Penelope: Yes, Your Honour. That is, I tended to believe them.

  Judge: I understand they were frequently impertinent.

  Penelope: Yes, Your Honour, but ...

  Judge: But you did not punish them, and they continued to work as your maids?

  Penelope: I knew them well, Your Honour. I was fond of them. I'd brought some of them up, you could say. They were like the daughters I never had. (Starts to weep.) I felt so sorry for them! But most maids got raped, sooner or later; a deplorable but common feature of palace life. It wasn't the fact of their being raped that told against them, in the mind of Odysseus. It's that they were raped without permission.

  Judge (chuckles): Excuse me, Madam, but isn't that what rape is? Without permission?

  Attorney for the Defence: Without permission of their master, Your Honour.

  Judge: Oh. I see. But their master wasn't present. So, in effect, these maids were forced to sleep with the Suitors because if they'd resisted they would have been raped anyway, and much more unpleasantly?

  Attorney for the Defence: I don't see what bearing that has on the case.

  Judge: Neither did your client, evidently. (Chuckles.) However, your client's times were not our times. Standards of behaviour were different then. It would be unfortunate if this regrettable but minor incident were allowed to stand as a blot on an otherwise exceedingly distinguished career. Also I do not wish to be guilty of an anachronism. Therefore I must dismiss the case.

  The Maids: We demand justice! We demand retribution! We invoke the law of blood guilt! We call upon the Angry Ones!

  A troop of twelve Erinyes appear. They have hair made of serpents, the heads of dogs, and the wings of bats. They sniff the air.

  The Maids: Oh Angry Ones, Oh Furies, you are our last hope! We implore you to inflict punishment and exact vengeance on our behalf! Be our defenders, we who had none in life! Smell out Odysseus wherever he goes! From one place to another, from one life to another, whatever disguise he puts on, whatever shape he may take, hunt him down! Dog his footsteps, on earth or in Hades, wherever he may take refuge, in songs and in plays, in tomes and in theses, in marginal notes and in appendices! Appear to him in our forms, our ruined forms, the forms of our pitiable corpses! Let him never be at rest!

  The Erinyes turn towards Odysseus. Their red eyes flash.

  Attorney for the Defence: I call on grey-eyed Pallas Athene, immortal daughter of Zeus, to defend property rights and the right of a man to be the master in his own house, and to spirit my client away in a cloud!

  Judge: What's going on? Order! Order! This is a twenty-first-century court of justice! You there, get down from the ceiling! Stop that barking and hissing! Madam, cover up your chest and put down your spear! What's this c
loud doing in here? Where are the police? Where's the defendant? Where has everyone gone?

  xxvii

  Home Life in Hades

  I was looking in on your world the other night, making use of the eyes of a channeller who'd gone into a trance. Her client wanted to contact her dead boyfriend about whether she should sell their condominium, but they got me instead. When there's an opening, I frequently jump in to fill it. I don't get out as often as I'd like.

  Not that I mean to disparage my hosts, as it were; but still, it's amazing how the living keep on pestering the dead. From age to age it hardly changes at all, though the methods vary. I can't say I miss the Sibyls much - them and their golden boughs, hauling along all sorts of upstarts to traipse around down here, wanting knowledge of the future and upsetting the Shades - but at least the Sibyls had some manners. The magicians and conjurors who came later were worse, though they did take the whole thing seriously.

  Today's bunch, however, are almost too trivial to merit any attention whatsoever. They want to hear about stock-market prices and world politics and their own health problems and such stupidities; in addition to which they want to converse with a lot of dead nonentities we in this realm cannot be expected to know. Who is this 'Marilyn' everyone is so keen on? Who is this 'Adolf'? It's a waste of energy to spend time with these people, and so exasperating.

  But it's only by peering through such limited keyholes that I'm able to keep track of Odysseus, during those times he's not down here in his own familiar form.

  I suppose you know the rules. If we wish to, we can get ourselves reborn, and have another try at life; but first we have to drink from the Waters of Forgetfulness, so our past lives will be wiped from our memories. Such is the theory; but, like all theories, it's only a theory. The Waters of Forgetfulness don't always work the way they're supposed to. Lots of people remember everything. Some say there's more than one kind of water - that the Waters of Memory are also on tap. I wouldn't know, myself.

  Helen has had more than a few excursions. That's what she calls them - 'my little excursions'. 'I've been having such fun,' she'll begin. Then she'll detail her latest conquests and fill me in on the changes in fashion. It was through her that I learned about patches, and sunshades, and bustles, and high-heeled shoes, and girdles, and bikinis, and aerobic exercises, and body piercings, and liposuction. Then she'll make a speech about how naughty she's been and how much uproar she's been causing and how many men she's ruined. Empires have fallen because of her, she's fond of saying.

  'I understand the interpretation of the whole Trojan War episode has changed,' I tell her, to take some of the wind out of her sails. 'Now they think you were just a myth. It was all about trade routes. That's what the scholars are saying.'

  'Oh, Penelope, you can't still be jealous,' she says. 'Surely we can be friends now! Why don't you come along with me to the upper world, next time I go? We could do a trip to Las Vegas. Girls' night out! But I forgot - that's not your style. You'd rather play the faithful little wifey, what with the weaving and so on. Bad me, I could never do it, I'd die of boredom. But you were always such a homebody.'

  She's right. I'll never drink the Waters of Forgetfulness. I can't see the point of it. No: I can see the point, but I don't want to take the risk. My past life was fraught with many difficulties, but who's to say the next one wouldn't be worse? Even with my limited access I can see that the world is just as dangerous as it was in my day, except that the misery and suffering are on a much wider scale. As for human nature, it's as tawdry as ever.

  None of this stops Odysseus. He'll drop in down here for a while, he'll act pleased to see me, he'll tell me home life with me was the only thing he ever really wanted, no matter what ravishing beauties he's been falling into bed with or what wild adventures he's been having. We'll take a peaceful stroll, snack on some asphodel, tell the old stories; I'll hear his news of Telemachus - he's a Member of Parliament now, I'm so proud! - and then, just when I'm starting to relax, when I'm feeling that I can forgive him for everything he put me through and accept him with all his faults, when I'm starting to believe that this time he really means it, off he goes again, making a beeline for the River Lethe to be born again.

  He does mean it. He really does. He wants to be with me. He weeps when he says it. But then some force tears us apart.

  It's the maids. He sees them in the distance, heading our way. They make him nervous. They make him restless. They cause him pain. They make him want to be anywhere and anyone else.

  He's been a French general, he's been a Mongolian invader, he's been a tycoon in America, he's been a headhunter in Borneo. He's been a film star, an inventor, an advertising man. It's always ended badly, with a suicide or an accident or a death in battle or an assassination, and then he's back here again.

  'Why can't you leave him alone?' I yell at the maids. I have to yell because they won't let me get near them. 'Surely it's enough! He did penance, he said the prayers, he got himself purified!'

  'It's not enough for us,' they call.

  'What more do you want from him?' I ask them. By this time I'm crying. 'Just tell me!'

  But they only run away.

  Run isn't quite accurate. Their legs don't move. Their still-twitching feet don't touch the ground.

  xxviii

  The Chorus Line: We're Walking Behind You, A Love Song

  Yoo hoo! Mr Nobody! Mr Nameless! Mr Master of Illusion! Mr Sleight of Hand, grandson of thieves and liars!

  We're here too, the ones without names. The other ones without names. The ones with the shame stuck onto us by others. The ones pointed at, the ones fingered.

  The chore girls, the bright-cheeked girls, the juicy gigglers, the cheeky young wigglers, the young bloodscrubbers.

  Twelve of us. Twelve moon-shaped bums, twelve yummy mouths, twenty-four feather-pillow tits, and best of all, twenty-four twitching feet.

  Remember us? Of course you do! We brought the water for you to wash your hands, we bathed your feet, we rinsed your laundry, we oiled your shoulders, we laughed at your jokes, we ground your corn, we turned down your cosy bed.

  You roped us in, you strung us up, you left us dangling like clothes on a line. What hijinks! What kicks! How virtuous you felt, how righteous, how purified, now that you'd got rid of the plump young dirty dirt-girls inside your head!

  You should have buried us properly. You should have poured wine over us. You should have prayed for our forgiveness.

  Now you can't get rid of us, wherever you go: in your life or your afterlife or any of your other lives.

  We can see through all your disguises: the paths of day, the paths of darkness, whichever paths you take - we're right behind you, following you like a trail of smoke, like a long tail, a tail made of girls, heavy as memory, light as air: twelve accusations, toes skimming the ground, hands tied behind our backs, tongues sticking out, eyes bulging, songs choked in our throats.

  Why did you murder us? What had we done to you that required our deaths? You never answered that.

  It was an act of grudging, it was an act of spite, it was an honour killing.

  Yoo hoo, Mr Thoughtfulness, Mr Goodness, Mr Godlike, Mr Judge! Look over your shoulder! Here we are, walking behind you, close, close by, close as a kiss, close as your own skin.

  We're the serving girls, we're here to serve you. We're here to serve you right. We'll never leave you, we'll stick to you like your shadow, soft and relentless as glue. Pretty maids, all in a row.

  xxix

  Envoi

  we had no voice

  we had no name

  we had no choice

  we had one face

  one face the same

  we took the blame

  it was not fair

  but now we're here

  we're all here too

  the same as you

  and now we follow

  you, we find you

  now, we call

  to you to you

  too wit too w
oo

  too wit too woo

  too woo

  The Maids sprout feathers, and fly away as owls.

  Notes

  The main source for The Penelopiad was Homer's Odyssey, in the Penguin Classics edition, translated by E.V. Rieu and revised by D.C.H. Rieu (1991).

  Robert Graves's The Greek Myths (Penguin) was crucial. The information about Penelope's ancestry, her family relations - Helen of Troy was her cousin - and much else, including the stories about her possible infidelity, are to be found there. (See Sections 160 and 171 in particular.) It is to Graves that I owe the theory of Penelope as a possible female-goddess cult leader, though oddly he does not note the significance of the numbers twelve and thirteen in relation to the unfortunate maids. Graves lists numerous sources for the stories and their variants. These sources include Herodotus, Pausanias, Apollodorus, and Hyginus, among many.

  The Homeric Hymns were also helpful - especially in relation to the god Hermes - and Lewis Hyde's Trickster Makes This World threw some light on the character of Odysseus.

  The Chorus of Maids is a tribute to the use of such choruses in Greek drama. The convention of burlesquing the main action was present in the satyr plays performed before serious dramas.

  Acknowledgements

  Very many thanks to early readers Graeme Gibson, Jess Gibson, Ramsay and Eleanor Cook, Phyllida Lloyd, Jennifer Osti-Fonseca, Surya Bhattacharya, and John Cullen; to my British agents, Vivienne Schuster and Diana McKay, and to my North American agent, Phoebe Larmore; to Louise Dennys of Knopf Canada, who edited with esprit; to Heather Sangster, queen of the semi-colons, and to Arnulf Conradi, who sent thought-rays from a distance; to Sarah Cooper and Michael Bradley, for general support and having lunch; to Coleen Quinn, who keeps me in shape; to Gene Goldberg, fastest mouth on the phone; to Eileen Allen and to Melinda Dabaay; and to Arthur Gelgoot Associates. And to Jamie Byng of Canongate, who leapt out from behind a gorse bush in Scotland and talked me into it.