The Maid's Story in Margaret Atwood's the Penelopiad

The Maids' Story in Margaret Atwood's The Penelopiad

At the beginning of the twentieth-first century the Canongate Press approached the finest writers of our time, asking them to write contemporary versions of universal myths. The Canadian writer Margaret Atwood chose to write a modern version of the Homeric epic, The Odyssey, or more precisely of the story of Penelope and the twelve hanged maids. While the story of Penelope is clearly the main plot line of The Penelopiad, it is juxtaposed in the novel with the story of the maids conveyed in the form of a chanting chorus. Whereas most literary scholars concentrate on the ideological connotations of the maids' story as a critique of the dominant patriarchal order, I intend to address the question of Atwood's use of the chorus and her subversion of that ancient dramatic device.

According to The Harper Handbook to Literature, the chorus in Greek drama represents:

... the group of singers and dancers that appears at intervals within the play to comment on the action or the antagonists, or sing the praise of the gods. Generally, the chorus expresses the judgment of objective bystanders, representative of the best morality of the community, but not directly involved in the passions of the protagonists and the other major characters. (Frye, Baker and Perkins 101)

In accordance with the ancient tradition, Margaret Atwood labels the maids' story as "chorus lines" and focuses on the performance aspect of the maids' delivery by incorporating songs and dance elements. The chanting quality is captured in several chorus lines, including "If I Were a Princess," "The Wily Sea Captain," and "Dreamboats." All the above chorus lines imitate various forms of popular songs, including the ballad, love song, popular tune and sea shanty. In her choice of song forms, Atwood often matches the form itself and the subject. This is the case with "The Wily Sea Captain" which captures Odysseus' adventures after Troy in a traditional sea-shanty form. Similarly, the forms of the ballad and popular songs are used to convey the maids' dreams about love and happiness.

In contrast to the ancient chorus, Atwood's chorus lines do not express the judgment of objective bystanders, but capture the involvement and emotions of minor characters directly engaged in the action. Given the opportunity to tell their own story, the maids describe their humble origin, their life of servitude and their total dedication to their masters. More importantly, they present a different version of Penelope's conduct during her husband's absence and reveal her cunning scheme to use them as scapegoats for her infidelities and betrayal. With their low social status and flawed behaviour, the maids do not represent the morality of the community, an essential function of the ancient chorus.

The most pronounced difference between chorus lines and the ancient chorus involves the discrepancy between the subject matter and style, or more precisely the frivolous and comic treatment of a very tragic story. This unusual combination of a serious subject and a low style has all the characteristics of the burlesque, a form of comedy characterized by ridiculous exaggeration and distortion of literary conventions. (Holman 65)

As befits the burlesque, chorus lines in The Penelopiad are distinguished by a deflationary treatment of a serious subject and a comic presentation of dramatic situations. This tendency is most evident in the chorus line depicting the trial of Odysseus in a contemporary court. Introduced as a videotape secretly recorded by the maids, this episode mocks the defence argument of Odysseus' slaying of the suitors as an act of self-defence and Telemachus' execution of the maids as their penalty for having sex with the suitors without the permission of their master. The mocking tone of this chorus line is evident in the pompous but shallow language of the defence attorney, laden as it is with legal clichés, sarcastic references to the suitors, and sexist remarks about the maids. The attorney refers to Odysseus as "my esteemed client" and addresses the judge and prosecutor respectively as "Your Honour" and "my respected colleague". In overtly sarcastic terms he accuses the suitors of "having played the gourmand a little too freely" (p.176) and expresses his disregard for them by referring to their number as "upwards of a hundred and twenty well-born young men, give or take a dozen" (p.175). The attorney reveals his contempt for the maids in his sexist remarks about them as "the best looking and the most beddable, certainly. For the most part." (p.179).

The most absurd and comical elements of the videotape capture the judge's amusement with the court proceedings and his concern with court decorum rather than the case itself. The judge chuckles repeatedly during Penelope's testimony clarifying the maids' sexual relations with the suitors. He gets very upset by the unexpected intrusion of the maids and reprimands them for their inappropriate appearance and behaviour:

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! (Atwood 177)

In an absurd fashion the judge consults the text of Homer's epic to verify the details of the slaying and the social and legal norms of that period. Afraid to be accused of anachronism, the judge dismisses the case against Odysseus on the grounds of self-defence and his right to be the master in his own house.

Whereas "The Trial of Odysseus" subverts the generic conventions of the dramatic chorus, "An Anthropology Lecture" parodies a pseudo-scientific anthropological interpretation of the maids' significance.