Throughout the Odyssey the men do
not really care for women, nor the women for men; they have to
pretend to do so now and again, but it is a got-up thing, and the
general attitude of the sexes towards one another is very much that
of Helen, who says that her husband Menelaus is really not deficient
in person or understanding: or again of Penelope herself, who, on
being asked by Ulysses on his return what she thought of him, said
that she did not think very much of him nor very little of him; in
fact, she did not think much about him one way or the other. True,
later on she relents and becomes more effusive; in fact, when she
and Ulysses sat up talking in bed and Ulysses told her the story of
his adventures, she never went to sleep once. Ulysses never had to
nudge her with his elbow and say, "Come, wake up, Penelope, you are
not listening"; but, in spite of the devotion exhibited here, the
love-business in the Odyssey is artificial and described by one who
had never felt it, whereas in the Iliad it is spontaneous and
obviously genuine, as by one who knows all about it perfectly well.
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