When a Feminist Meets the Muse

A critical essay on Margaret Atwood's 'The Penelopiad.The Myth of Penelope and Odysseus'. An attempt made by Atwood to reread the myth of Penelope might be easily disregarded as a trivial postmodernist pastiche bearing too much resemblance to school assignments. Yet it is argued here that the novel deserves more serious consideration as belonging to the genre of 'historicizing writings' instead of being a mere literary game, since its true value lies in Atwood's ability to evoke the problems of the present by referring to the past.