The Odyssey is packed with families that act as models for how the story of Odysseus’ family could turn out. Some have good endings, like the success story of Menelaos’ family: when Telemachos arrives in Sparta at the start of book 4, he observes the marriage of an analogue to himself, carrying on the family to the next generation. And some have bad endings.
Two unfaithful wives are highlighted as the main potential ‘bad ending’ narratives: the stories of Helen (Menelaos’ wife) and Klytaimestra (Agamemnon’s wife). Of these, Helen is most prominent in book 4 (and actually appears in person), and we get to see a scenario where the ‘bad ending’ has finished playing out and the family is reunited. Agamemnon’s family, however, are cited over and over again all the way through the Odyssey, all the way from book 1 to book 24.
Agamemnon’s murder and its aftermath is foregrounded starting from the very first scene. Go take a look: the first thing anyone says in the entire Odyssey is Zeus saying ‘Isn’t it good that Orestes, Agamemnon’s son, has taken vengeance for his father’s murder?’ Later on in book 1, when Athena/Mentes visits Odysseus’ house to get Telemachos moving, they do so by citing Orestes as an example for Telemachos to follow (Od. 1.298-300).
In books 3 and 4 we get on to Agamemnon himself: there Nestor and Menelaos tell complementary stories about Agamemnon’s disastrous homecoming, focusing on Aigisthos as the murderer. Klytaimestra gets mentioned for the first time at this point (Od. 3.235, 265-272), and Orestes is still being highlighted as a model for Telemachos to follow (e.g. 3.193-209).
Agamemnon’s family are mentioned again in books 11, 13, and 24, and it’s here that Klytaimestra is most directly compared to Penelope. In book 11 Agamemnon’s ghost relates his murder (11.421-434), then follows this up by telling Odysseus (11.441-456, tr. Hammond):
So you too should never be too kind even to your wife: and do not tell her all that you know — reveal some of any plan, but keep part hidden also. But for you, Odysseus, there is no danger of death at your wife’s hands. The good Penelope, daughter of Ikarios, is a woman of great sense and a loyal heart. … But my wife did not even allow me to fill my eyes with sight of my son — before that could be she killed me. I tell you another thing, and you mark it well in your mind. When you bring your ship in to your dear native land, put in secretly, not in open view: women can be trusted no more.
And in book 13, Athena tells Odysseus about Penelope’s situation, and Odysseus immediately follows this up with a comparison to Agamemnon’s homecoming (13.376-385):
‘… you must think how to lay hands on the shameless suitors, courting your wife and offering marriage-gifts for her. Her heart is always yearning in sorrow for your return, but she keeps them all hopeful, making promises to each of them and sending them messages, while her intention is far different.’
Resourceful Odysseus answered her: ‘Oh, I would then for sure have met the wretched fate of Agamemnon, son of Atreus, and died like him in my own house, if you had not told me all this, goddess, and the truth as it is.’
Notice the mixed messages in both of these passages. Agamemnon and Athena both say Penelope can be trusted, but in both scenes this is couched within a much less optimistic view: Agamemnon starts and finishes by warning Odysseus not to trust her an inch; Athena’s report of her actions suggests the exact opposite of fidelity; Odysseus actually says that he was about to be killed by her.
These paradoxical passages are designed to keep open the possibility of Penelope betraying Odysseus. We know that she’s faithful, really, but the Odyssey poet loves playing with unrealised potential scenarios like this. The same thing happens at the start of book 15, though there’s no parallel drawn with Agamemnon’s family there: at 15.15-26 Athena tells Telemachos that Penelope is on the point of marrying one of the suitors and he needs to take precautions.
The comparison with Klytaimestra in book 24 is after the dust has settled: Penelope’s loyalty is a settled thing at this point, so Agamemnon cites Klytaimestra as a contrast to Penelope, rather than a potential model (24.192-202):
Oh, happy son of Laertes, resourceful Odysseus, the wife you won was a wife of great worth! What a loyal heart there was in the excellent Penelope … Not so the daughter of Tyndareos [i.e. Klytaimestra], who plotted a foul crime and killed the husband of her marriage. Hers will be a hateful place in men’s song, and she will give a bad name to all of the female sex, even the virtuous.
The Odyssey’s obsession with ‘what if’ scenarios and potential storylines is all over the place — it isn’t confined to Klytaimestra. The conversation between Penelope and the disguised Odysseus in book 19 is another case where potential alternate storylines are being played out simultaneously. Many readers, (in)famously, believe that she’s already worked out who Odysseus is at that point, and is putting on an act; at the same time Odysseus’ repeated efforts to conceal his identity are a cue to the reader that she doesn’t know. In book 18, when Penelope demands marriage gifts from the suitors, there’s another ‘what if’ scenario: is she actually planning to marry one of them, or is it a trick? And it’s only when the narrator cuts to Odysseus’ reaction that we get cued to interpret it as a trick.
There’s an entire book about this business of playing out multiple competing storylines simultaneously: Nancy Felson’s Regarding Penelope (1994). A condensed and more direct form of Felson’s argument appears in her chapter in Bremer et al. (eds.) Homer: beyond oral poetry (1987), and was reprinted in Schein (ed.), Reading the Odyssey (1996).
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