Elias, 9

Kelton Elias
12/11/18
Gardner, G block
So, Are They Really Guilty?

The book The Penelopiad by Margret Atwood tells the story of the Odyssey from

Penelope’s perspective. The book starts off with the sad background of Penelope and how her

father attempts to drown her although the story focusses on Penelope, the Maids appeared a lot in

the book, expressing their feelings. Even though the Maids were killed because of their

disloyalty to Odysseus, it can be shown through the story, that they were just following

Penelope’s orders. Throughout the rest of the book, the Maids have their part in saying their

opinion in order to gain justice. In the Penelopiad, the Maids do not achieve justice due to their

lack of social power and loyal people to listen to their opinion.

Despite the maid's effort, they were not able to achieve justice over Odysseus' attempt to

remain innocent. The Maids lack of social power stood in their way of gaining justice in the

Penelopiad because they had no one that cared about them. The way the Suitors treated the

Maids sexually and verbally dehumanized them, placing them at the bottom of the totem pole.

To this, Penelope’s only argument was that the suitors raped them without Odysseus’

permission, therefore making it wrong. "Once more we toil and slave, and hoist our skirts at their

command" (126). The maid’s position there makes it harder for the Maids to gain any

recognition from anyone, even from Penelope. Since Penelope instructed the Maids to act as if

they were on the Suitors side without considering the consequences, they ended up dying still in

the end.
 Elias, 9

Along with having a poor social power comes a lack of loyalty from anyone, even people

like Penelope who the Maids knew since they were all little kids. Due these disadvantages, the

Maids lacked people who they could trust to keep them safe.

The Maids try hard to help the reader to feel sympathy for them in order to gain positive

opinions towards them due to the lack of loyalty from friends. The maid’s unfortunate position at

the bottom of the social latter leaves them with no friends or loyal people they can trust. Luckily,

they still have each other to provide emotional support when challenging situations come in

hand, for instance, when the suitors come to rape them. Because of their lack of loyal people that

have a higher social standing, the Maids didn’t have the right to complain to Penelope about how

the suitors treat them. This puts the Maids in a situation that allows other people to do whatever

they please to them without getting in trouble. The Maids made it important to gain justice

although it never ended up happening. "We demand justice! We demand retribution! We invoke

the law of blood guilt!"(183). The Maids saw this as a problem and used the Penelopiad as a way

to complain and express their problems.

The Maids worked hard to gain justice over Odysseus throughout the book only for it to

end without success. After clearing their minds, the Maids did end up achieving something

through the book even though it wasn’t something as big as justice. Using the Penelopiad the

Maids gained a positive relationship with the reader along with sympathy to help put the reader

in their shoes. The story of the Maids is similar to the way some men treat women in the present

day. Women that have been sexually mistreated are slowly beginning to gain justice by speaking

out and parting right from wrong. This is something the Maids could have done to prevent the

suitors mistreating them before having their lives taken away from them.
 Elias, 9

Works Cited

Atwood, Margaret. The Penelopiad. Edinburgh: Canongate Books Ltd, 2005. Print.