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- Penelope believes that Odysseus is still alive and will return home to her, but the men who want to marry her and by doing so take control of Ithaca, are impatient with her and want her to choose one of them.
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How do you think the fact that Penelope is a woman in a society ruled by men influences the ways in which she responds to some of the challenges she faces? CHRISTINE PLASTOW Well, as you say, Penelope is a woman in a patriarchal society.
Does Penelope really intend to marry one of her suitors? How do Odysseus and Telemachus defeat the suitors? Would Odysseus have survived without Athena’s help?
Penelope's cleverness, excellent household management, and apparently innate sense of modesty make her ancient Greece's ideal woman. She's less of a real person than a type, someone for all you ladies out there to model yourselves on.
The suitors are impious to plot against a man that is loved by the gods (not to mention whose hospitality they are abusing), because they are pitting their wills against the wills of the gods. Penelope, on the other hand, respects divine will by asking for Athena's help.
Penelope tests him by asking specific questions about the clothing and comrades of Odysseus. The beggar/Odysseus has impressive answers, citing a purple woolen cape and a gold clasp with a hound clenching a fawn.
Although unassuming, Penelope has a cunning that indicates she is a good mate for her wily husband. Antinous complains of it at the assembly in Book 2. He claims — rightly, by the way — that she has misguided the suitors for nearly four years, leading on each man with hints and promises but choosing no one.
