Quotes Penelopiad Part A (competition/roles/wisdom/patriarch) Flashcards
Clever not beautiful quote
clever but not overly beautiful
Helen showing off quote
I was not like cousin Helen who loved to make conquests just to show she could.
Offer instead of beauty quote
I was a kind girl - kinder than Helen, or so I thought. I knew I would have something to offer instead of beauty
Clever quote
I was clever…. but cleverness is a quality a man likes to have in his wife as long as she is some distance away from him
Helen attention quote
She wanted all the attention for herself
Faithful quote
Hadn’t I been faithful? Hadn’t I waited, and waited, and waited, despite the temptation - almost the compulsion - to do otherwise?
Stick to beat other women with quote
amount to […] a stick used to beat other women with
Restricting/lack of power
I kept my mouth shut […] I didn’t contradict, I didn’t ask awkward questions, I didn’t dig deep.
Keeping right doors locked quotes
Happy endings are best achieved by keeping the rights doors locked and going to sleep during the rampages
Determined/patient
determined nature, patient
Semi-divine birth benefits
it never hurts to be of semi-divine birth
Father throws her out to sea
When I was quite young my father ordered me to be thrown out into the sea
Whispering quote
it’s hard to know whether the whispering is coming from others or from the inside of your own head
Arranged marriage
My marriage was arranged. That’s the way things were done then
Important people marriages
only important people had marriages, because only important people had marriages
Purpose of marriage children
Marriages were for having children
Purpose of having children (2)
Children were vehicles for passing things along
to have a child was to set loose a force in the world
Package of meat quote
And so I was handed over to Odysseus, like a package of meat
Widow quote
Widows are supposed to be consumed with lust, especially if their husbands have been missing or dead for such a long time
Mother’s life sacred quote
a mother’s life is sacred
Opening line/dead know everything
Now that I’m dead I know everything. This is what I wished would happen, but like so many of my wishes it failed to come true. I know only a few factoids that I didn’t know before”
Death + curiosity
Death is much too high a price to pay for the satisfaction of curiosity.
Quote on death nothingness (2)
Since being dead - since achieving this state of bonelessness, liplessness…
It was glorious to feel the blood coursing in our non-existent veins again, if only for an instant
Quote about sack containing words
everyone arrives with a sack…each of these sacks is full of words - words you’ve spoken, words you’ve heard, words that have been said about you
Making fools Odysseus
What a fool he made of me, some say
It was a speciality of his: making fools. He got away with everything, which was another one of his specialities: getting away.
Distrust
It is to this episode - or rather to my knowledge of it - that I attribute my reserve, as well as my mistrust of other people’s intentions
Self sufficient
self sufficiency
Looking out for self
I knew that I would have to look out for myself in the world. I could hardly count on family support
Little power in home quote as wife
After a time I became more accustomed to my new home, although I had little authority within it.
Maids responsible for household tasks
running all domestic matters - maids
Believing Odysseus
Even I believed him from time to time
Tricky and a liar quote (2)
I knew he was tricky and a liar, I just didn’t think he would play his tricks and try out his lies on me
a cheat and a thief
Don’t follow example
Don’t follow my example, I want to scream in your ears
Immoral Odysseus quote
Of course I had inklings, about his slipperiness, his wiliness, his foxiness, his - how can I put this? - his unscrupulousness, but I turned a blind eye
Immoral suitors
The suitors stuff their faces
Role as having a child quote
“so you can have a nice big son for Odysseus” - “that’s your job”
