The Penelopiad - (Canons) by Margaret Atwood

About the Book

"Penelope . . . immortalised in legend and Greek myth as the devoted wife of the glorious Odysseus, silently weaving and unpicking and weaving again as she waits for her husband's return from the Trojan war. Now, in Atwood's wise and witty retelling of the myth, Penelope wanders the underworld, spinning a different kind of thread: her own side of the story -- a tale of lust, greed and murder"--

Book Synopsis

The 20th anniversary edition of Margaret Atwood's iconic tale with a new foreword by the author and an afterword by Philip Pullman.

A fresh take on what follows Homer's The Odyssey by the international best-selling author of The Handmaid's Tale.

Now that all the others have run out of air, it's my turn to do a little story-making . . . So I'll spin my own thread.

Penelope. Immortalized in legend and myth as the devoted wife of the glorious Odysseus, silently weaving and unpicking and weaving again as she waits for her husband's return.

Now Penelope wanders the underworld, spinning a different kind of thread: Her own side of the story is a tale of lust, greed and murder.

Atwood breathes new life into the classic story by giving a voice to Penelope and daring to ask what led to the hanging of twelve maids.

Review Quotes

"Explores the very nature of mythic story-telling." --Mary Beard, distinguished classicist and international bestselling author

"Determinedly irreverent." --New York Times

"Atwood's brilliance emerges in the skillful way she's woven her own research on the anthropological underpinnings of Home's epic into the patterns of her own stylized version of the poem. . . . A fascinating and really attractive version of this old, old story, a creation tale about the founding of our civilization meant to be heard over and over and over." --NPR

"Visually stunning and unforgettable."--New York Times Book Review

"As potent as a curse."--The Sunday Times

"A witty desecration."--The Observer

"Pragmatic, clever, domestic, mournful, Penelope is a perfect Atwood heroine."--The Spectator

"Half Dorothy Parker, half Desperate Housewives." --The Independent

About the Author

Margaret Atwood is the author of more than forty books of fiction, poetry and critical essays. In addition to the classic The Handmaid's Tale, her novels include Cat's Eye, shortlisted for the Booker Prize, Alias Grace, which won the Giller Prize in Canada and the Premio Mondello in Italy, The Blind Assassin, winner of the 2000 Booker Prize and Oryx and Crake, shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. She was awarded the Prince of Asturias Prize for Literature in 2008. In 2017, The Handmaid's Tale was adapted for an Emmy-nominated TV series and Alias Grace was adapted into a Netflix Original.