Transcript of Video Essay on Odysseus and Penelope

My video essay on Odysseus and Penelope

0. Introduction

If I took away one lesson from the Odyssey, it’s that you gotta choose your wife well. Because here’s the range of outcomes. She starts a war in which almost all of your friends dies, she cheats on you while you’re fighting for your nation, and kills you with the man who she’s been cheating with you on upon your return, or she holds the fort down for 20 years, raises your son, and ennobles your legacy.

The Greek heroes in Homer could not have more different outcomes, and it is strongly determined by the woman that they choose to marry.

Now, of course, Penelope is the classical ideal of an amazing wife. But what makes her so great? Why does Odysseus reject offers from goddesses, from Nausicaa, who’s a woman much more younger, more beautiful, from a much wealthier kingdom, why does Odysseus reject Calypso’s offer of immortality to risk life and limb to go back to Penelope? That’s what I want to answer in this video today. By comparing Penelope, as I think Homer invites us t…