Feminine Strength: Penny and Penelope

Jamie Mann wrote:

Throughout the early 1900’s, women’s revolutionary campaigns for gender equality and the right to vote were widespread in the United States. With the 19th Amendment that passed in 1920, women gained the right to vote. Because of the dramatic decline in the economy with the stock market crash in 1929, women’s rights and suffrage movements were put on the backburner not only because they had accomplished much of what they had set out to achieve, but mainly because of the economic crisis. Although women’s rights had been put aside temporarily, women felt empowered and enthusiastic about their new freedoms and when it came to the need for them to work outside the home, women were more than willing to contribute. During the Great Depression, many men found themselves out of work, and women found it necessary to hold the family unit together. Most men found their lack of work incredibly degrading because they were not able to support their wives and children. Men who could not find work were sometimes so humiliated by their incapability to provide for their family and found it so shameful that they abandoned their families, leaving their wives to support their children. When the man of the household was unable to contribute to the survival of his family, the woman of the household was forced to go out and find work. The women who were lucky enough to find jobs were looked down upon because it was seen as if they were taking jobs away from men who needed to support their families.

Although much was accomplished with the Women’s Rights Movement during the beginning of the 20th Century as women took on more male-dominated jobs and the men of the United States went off to fight the first World War, a lot of this was forgotten when the stock market crashed and left so many people without jobs or any means to feed their families. Much of what was gained during the first wave of the Women’s Rights Movement with gender equality in the workplace was lost during this period. Women who were divorced or widowed often found it more difficult to provide for their families not only because of the stigma that being divorced placed on a woman in this time, but because of the inability to find work or even childcare to leave the home. Many women were forced to try to find seasonal or temporary work and even when they did they were discriminated against. Although society looked down upon women in the workplace they persevered through this tragic period to sustain their families. The Great Depression was a catastrophic time for both men and women. Through this difficult time, women fought through deprivation and discrimination to provide for their families, showing a woman’s true strength when faced with life’s horrific battles.

The movie O Brother Where Art Thou? is set during the Great Depression. The character Penny, who is supposed to mirror the character Penelope in Homer’s The Odyssey, is vastly different from the woman she is representing, but as women, they share similar characteristics. Penny is distinctive of a woman during the early 1900’s. She is a strong and demanding woman who stops at nothing to provide for her family and does what is necessary to hold her family together. Penny’s husband Everett is in prison for fraud and she is tired and ashamed his immature actions. She tells everyone that he was hit and killed by a train. She claims her independence and willingness to overcome hardships by divorcing Everett while he is in prison and then allows herself to be courted by another man, Vernon Waldrip. Penny, unlike Penelope, decides against waiting for her husband to take care of her. She takes matters into her own hands when she decides to marry. Vernon is one of the lucky few that are very well off even though the rest of the country is in financial peril. This move on Penny’s part is a calculated action made to ensure the safety of her family during the unsure times of the Great Depression.
Women’s roles have vastly changed since the reciting of Homer’s epic poem The Odyssey.

Although women’s roles have changed, a woman’s vigor to fight for her rights and to fight for what she believes is right has remained the same. Penelope shows us in The Odyssey a woman’s strength, waiting years for her husband to return home from war. She shows this as she refuses to give up hope on her husband, even as she was being pressured to find a suitor to take her husbands’ place. She never gave up faith or neglected her morals. Penny, in the movie O Brother Where Art Thou? shows similar vigor, only in a different manner. She uses women’s new found equality to her advantage and decides to divorce her fraudulent husband and marry a man who would ensure her and her children’s futures during the insecure time of The Great Depression. Both women show strength through diversity, although within different circumstances. The film and the epic poem show us the great power of women at vastly different time periods.