A Thousand Ships

Penelope’s seven chapters in A Thousand Ships are presented in the form of letters, six addressed to Odysseus and a final one to Athena. The letters express Penelope’s increasing frustration with Odysseus’s failure to return home. She describes the stories that bards are singing about his exploits: provoking the Cyclops, taking up with goddesses, and seeking adventure over returning to his family. He, or someone claiming to be him, does finally return, but as Penelope explains to Athena, she does not feel certain that it is him, and she no longer particularly cares.

The adventures that Penelope describes are her sarcastic, and increasingly angry, summaries of Odysseus’s wanderings from Homer’s Odyssey. In Haynes’s novel, her narratives show the frustration of a woman left behind while her husband chooses danger over family ties. In addition, he exemplifies the warrior who cannot “survive the peace” (267). Haynes amplifies this point by having Penelope remain uncertain at the end whether the man claiming to be Odysseus is him.

In Homer’s Odyssey, Penelope tests Odysseus at the end, provoking him to prove that he is truly her husband. Her trick demonstrates both her cleverness and her similarity with Odysseus. They are mirrors of each other, both cunning tricksters who can spin schemes to achieve their ends.