Storytelling
Storytelling is perhaps the most important theme in the Penelopiad. The novel is Penelope's version of events, and it follows on centuries of scholarship about the male-dominated narrative of the Odyssey. While in the Odyssey, Penelope is a secondary character who is not much examined, Atwood gives her narrative center stage. Penelope disparages the way that she has been seen for centuries and suggests that it has reinforced sexism: "And what did I amount to, once the official version gained ground? An edifying legend. A stick used to beat other women with" (2). Penelope's faithfulness and docility have been famous for centuries, celebrated within the patriarchy as a picture of an "ideal" wife or woman. As Penelope explains in the Penelopiad, however, the truth is that she suffered greatly and had very little power to make decisions for herself. Additionally, she keeps an entire kingdom in line while Odysseus is away and yet is rarely given the credit she deserves. The Penelopiad allows Penelope to challenge the "official version" and explain how and why she did what she did while she was alive. She tells her story from the Underworld, centuries after her death. "Now that the others have run out of air," she says, "it's my turn to do a little story-making. I owe it to myself" (3).
Gender
Gender plays an important role in how the characters relate to each other in the Penelopiad. Penelope is an extremely wealthy noble who has enjoyed a considerable amount of privilege throughout her life. Despite this, she has very little power within her own home, where Odysseus calls the shots. When Odysseus disappears, she is forced to submit to incessant advances by rude suitors, just because it is automatically assumed that she is unable to run a kingdom on her own in the long run. This is despite the fact, of course, that Penelope does a great job at ruling Ithaca on her own while Odysseus is gone. Penelope's relationship with Telemachus perhaps best exemplifies the gender dynamics at work in the Penelopiad. Penelope is Telemachus' mother, and therefore, we might assume that she has a certain level of power over his life. However, once Telemachus reaches a certain age, he begins to push back against his mother's rule. Eventually, Telemachus gains more power than Penelope in the household, even though his father is still away. His relationship with his mother shifts, as Penelope recounts: "To add to my misery, Telemachus was now of an age to start ordering me around. I'd run the palace affairs almost single-handedly for twenty years, but now he wanted to assert his authority as the son of Odysseus and take over the reins" (121). Penelope has power within her castle as long as there is no man to "take over the reins." As soon as one appears—Odysseus's return or Telemachus' coming-of-age—she is dethroned and automatically placed back in the subservient position of wife. When Telemachus sneaks out of the house to search for his father, he defends his actions in gendered terms: "He claimed his father would have been proud of him for showing some backbone and getting out from under the thumbs of the women, who as usual were being overemotional and showing no reasonableness and judgment" (128).
Class
Class is a major theme in the Penelopiad, particularly when it comes to the characters of the twelve maids. Class separates the maids' experience, which is mediated by their gender, from Penelope's. Like Penelope, the twelve maids have limited power and freedom in ancient Greek society. However, their lives are even more difficult than Penelope's. They perform important tasks that keep the castle running, but they are marginalized and pushed to the shadows. They are treated as objects more than people. Because they are seen as dispensable, they die a gruesome death. The maids introduce themselves in "The Chorus Line: A Rope-Jumping Rhyme": "we are the maids / the ones you killed / the ones you failed" (5). The maids describe how they were viewed within the castle: "We were told we were dirty. We were dirty. Dirt was our concern, dirty was our business, dirt was our specialty, dirt was our fault. We were dirty girls" (13). Penelope grows very fond of the maids and they are her conspirators within the castle. They flirt with the suitors in order to give Penelope information about them. They also, as a result, are raped by the suitors. Some of the maids fall in love with some of the suitors and are forced to clean up their lovers' blood after Odysseus and Telemachus kill all of them. Then, they are killed for the shame they carry due to their relationships (consensual or otherwise) with these men.
Fate
The question of fate looms large over many Ancient Greek stories. Often, the tragic or triumphant hero is at the mercy of his fate, which is determined by the "Three Fates" (or "Three Fatal Sisters"). The three Fates spin the threads of mens' lives, determining when that thread will be cut. In Atwood's version of events, the question of fate is a bit murkier. Odysseus and Penelope believe in the Fates and the power they hold over every person's life. Odysseus tells Penelope early in their marriage that he wants to unlock the "hidden door" within every person because "he who could master the hearts of men and learn their secrets" was closer to mastering fate and "controlling the thread of his own destiny" (58). However, he is quick to note how powerful the Fates really are: "Not, he hastened to add, that any man could really do that. Not even the gods, he said, were more powerful than the Three Fatal Sisters. He did not mention them by name, but spat to avoid bad luck" (58). However, the question of whether Odysseus really went on those adventures is never solved by the novel—Penelope never really finds out the truth. Therefore, it is also unclear whether the Fates are what caused Odysseus's journey or if, instead, it was his own male folly. At the end of the novel, we learn that he did not stay home long after arriving back in Ithaca—Odysseus's feet cannot sit still. Is it his personality or his destiny that is the driving force?
Hospitality
While many cultures still place great value on hospitality today, it was seen as a moral obligation in Ancient Greece. Hospitality customs dictated rituals of generosity and gift-giving towards foreigners and guests, even unwanted or unwelcome guests. This is why, when the suitors flood Ithaca to harass Penelope, she must nevertheless make them comfortable in her home. Even though the suitors abuse their welcome—eating "as if to outdo all the others at eating"—Penelope nevertheless gives them food and a place to sleep (104). These suitors see Ithaca as having no "master of the house" and therefore exhibit terrible behavior as guests. They eat too much and are rude to Penelope. They also—perhaps their most insulting transgression in Penelope's eyes—sexually harass and rape the twelve maids that help Penelope every night to undo the shroud. Penelope likens the suitors' treatment of the maids to "thievery" and explains that these suitors see them as little more than amenities of the palace: "there was no master of the house. So the suitors helped themselves to the maids in the same way they helped themselves to the sheep and pigs and goats and cows" (116). Eventually, once Odysseus returns, the suitors will be slaughtered in return for their slights against the kingdom in Odysseus's absence. While this might seem like an extreme action by today's standards, the suitors' abuse of hospitality rites was an incredible insult in Homer's time. Their death would have been a satisfying conclusion for the contemporary listener of The Odyssey.
Survival
When Penelope marries Odysseus, her Naiad mother gives her important advice that she will later use when dealing with the suitors. She tells her daughter to be like water: "Water does not resist. Water flows" (43). Penelope will rely on this strategy when her life is most at risk, as her palace has been overpopulated by greedy men who want to harm her. She ingeniously comes up with a plot to fend them off and is able to successfully do so until Odysseus arrives to save the day. Penelope's memory of her mother's important advice communicates a major theme throughout Penelopiad: that of survival. Throughout the novel, characters are concerned with different kinds of survival: survival of reputation, survival in the family, survival of lineage, and survival in marriage. As Valarie Miner argues, characters in Atwood's novel use whatever tools are at their disposal to survive: "Odysseus survives because of his agility and strength. Helen survives because people covet her powerful beauty. Penelope survives through her patience and wiles."
Strikingly, the twelve maids do not survive. Instead, they are cruelly slaughtered by Odysseus. They are so disenfranchised by their class position that even though they are charming, beautiful, and crafty, they are not afforded the same victorious fate as Odysseus, Helen, and Penelope. Instead, their positive qualities—those same qualities that cause Penelope to choose them in the first place—are the reason for their ultimate downfall.
Justice
The theme of justice appears as the Penelopiad comes to a close, after Odysseus has come to Ithaca and slaughtered the suitors and maids. Almost as soon as Odysseus has returned home, he tells Penelope he has to carry an oar inland to atone for killing the suitors: "only in that way could he rinse the blood of the Suitors from himself, avoid their vengeful ghosts and vengeful relatives" (174). Despite the fact that he completes this task, there is a modern-day trial of Odysseus in chapter 26, "The Trial of Odysseus, as Videotaped by the Maids." In this chapter, an attorney for Odysseus's defense argues that he was justified in killing the suitors because of their behavior in Ithaca and asks the judge to "dismiss the case" (177). The judge agrees, declaring Odysseus an innocent man.
Before the trial can conclude, however, the maids protest that no one is discussing their deaths: "You've forgotten about us! What about our case? You can't let him off! He hanged us in cold blood!" (177). The attorney's argument is simple: Odysseus acted within his rights because the maids were his property. The judge replies that maids should not be killed for no reason, even if they were Odysseus's property. He consults The Odyssey, which he takes as the "main authority" of what occurred, where it says the maids were raped by the suitors (179). Ultimately, the judge decides that the maids were innocent and did not deserve to be killed by Odysseus. However, he nevertheless dismisses the case, declaring Odysseus's innocence, because "standards of behaviour were different" in Ancient Greece (182).
In the end, the maids are forced to enact their own justice themselves. They call upon the Furies, vengeful deities, to hunt down Odysseus wherever he goes, so that he is never at rest. In Hades, the spirits of the twelve maids are always following Odysseus around, ensuring that he never has peace.
