Classics Colloquium with Dr. Justine McConnell

Tayari Jones’ novel An American Marriage (2018) ‘re-visions’ Homer’s Odyssey in the context of twenty-first-century America and the persistence of what Michelle Alexander has termed ‘the new Jim Crow’. The Odyssean intertext is only one of many threads within the narrative, but through it, Jones goes beyond creating space for the female voice or inverting the gender roles of ancient epic. Rather, alert to the oppressive nature of silencing, she creates space and voice for wife, husband, and suitor alike, and recasts Penelope’s weaving as an empowered action. While Homer’s ‘reverse similes’ give the audience fleeting glimpses of an imagined gender equality, Jones’ novel actualises that equality, and as the characters carve out their narratives in the face of a racialized criminal justice system, their stories stand as acts of resistance.