You’d never see Penelope driving a stake into
Polyphemus’ eye while Odysseus warded suitors off at home by claiming that he
really had to focus on his weaving. Trickery in The Odyssey often directly reflects differences in conventional
roles of each gender.
Deception by illustrious femme fatale characters such as Calypso echo a basic view of women
as the root of evil. In terms of ‘romantic mischief’, females and males are not
held to the same standards in the epic. Supposedly, Calypso clouds Odysseus’ judgment
with her enchanting feminine qualities—a theme that repeats in the epic. Following the lines of the fundamental tale of
Pandora releasing evils to mankind, Odysseus’ recount of his interaction with
Calypso pushes all the blame for his negative circumstance upon Calypso’s sexual
allure and frames her as an irresistibly conniving female. In this sense, the depiction
of Calypso’s holding of Odysseus aligns with the classic view of women as
stealers of innocence; it seems as though it is all Calypso’s fault that
Odysseus has grown old and cannot be with his wife. Calypso herself laments
upon the unfair treatment of her manipulative behavior and chastises the “vile
gods” who “hate it when [goddesses] choose to lie with men”, while the gods
themselves get away with tricking mortal women into their beds.
Besides sex, other receptacles of women’s
tricks (such as Penelope’s loom or Circe’s wine goblets) also mirror societal
ideas of the female gender. Penelope’s situation exemplifies the typical position
of women waiting at home while their husbands fight the war. Her lack of mobility
and lack of choice as a woman (she would be forced to choose a suitor
eventually) force her to weave and unweave her loom in order to deceive the suitors;
though cunning, Penelope also has little else she can do. Not permitted to
explore as Odysseus can, Penelope must express her dissatisfaction within the
house society has confined her to. Circe’s use of wine goblets to trick men
also agrees with the domestic niche of women at the time. The cleverness of
female deception is often undermined by men’s more fantastic and more “acceptable”
trickery.
Odysseus gains glory as the strategizing
warrior, while Athena, an essential impetus behind Odysseus’ actions, achieves
no recognition. In fact, Odysseus gets to tell epic tales of defeating monsters
with his shrewdness, while Athena’s deception consists of concealing her own
identity. Epithets such as “great tactician” or “master strategist” name
Odysseus though his own hubris leads to his suffering. This phenomena corresponds
with men’s positions at the “head of the family”, while women stand beside them
and do the “behind-the-scenes” work. Ultimately,
The Odyssey fails to break past
archaic ideals of gender when depicting the actions of trickery of its
characters.
I like how you used examples of trickery to show how The Odyssey does not break the conventional ideal of gender. When speaking about Kalypso I do acknowledge that Odysseus feels guilt about what he has done and thus it may come across as blaming her for everything. The evidence in the text though is that although he did succumb to her beauty at points, he also spent nearly seven years crying over not being able to leave the island. Kalypso even acknowledges him as "forlorn man" and says "here you need grieve no more; you need not feel your life consumed here" (85-86). The blame may be put on her, but rightfully so in this case.
ReplyDeleteI really like your commentary on the double standard that the male gods impose upon the female gods, showing a common theme on both the mortal and immortal fronts. One thing that I disagree with is Athena not achieving recognition. While Odysseus certainly does receive more recognition than her, I think that it is pretty clear that both he and the reader see that, without Athena, Odysseus would have had a watery grave long ago.
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