Also, while Homer goes to great lengths to highlight Odysseus as the "trickster", "dissembler", and "tactician", Atwood is equally successful in causing the reader to continually sift through Penelope's thoughts and statements for the kernels of Truth in her story, and in this task it is sometimes wise to pay attention to the Chorus.
I have to say that each of these choral interludes works very well in bringing to life these twelve, largely unknown, maids.
In contrast, Archaic Greece saw a shift towards democratic rule and resulting intellectual development. Also, in the Penelopiad, Penelope is actually dead and resides in Hades.
Beginning with her childhood, Penelope recounts the events of her life from beginning to end. In contrast, The Penelopiad, although it begins with Penelope telling the reader that she is relating the story from the Underworld, is told in chronological order.
Referring to the adapted text in this way serves to highlight the changing attitudes towards women and what they are capable of.
After the suitors were massacred, Odysseus instructed Telemachus to execute the maids who he believed were in league with them. When compared with the historical record, dominated by the stories in the Odyssey, the conclusion, as one academic states, is that the concepts of justice and penalties are established by "who has the power to say who is punished, whose ideas count", and that "justice is underwritten by social inequalities and inequitable power dynamics".
In both stories, the twelve maids are hanged for sleeping with the suitors and talking badly about Penelope and Eurycleia. The ancient form of justice and punishment, which was swift and simple due to the lack of courts, prisons, and currency, is tempered by more modern concepts of balanced distributions of social benefits and burdens.
Now it is time for a 'Warning' from the Management--If you haven't read The Odyssey before, and are truly concerned about plot spoilers, I suggest you toddle along and find another blog posting to read right now.