3 Review(s)

The culmination of over 30 years of studying and thinking about Homer, world renowned scholar and accomplished poet Barry Powell has produced what one reviewer calls a "page turner, bound to become the new standard." Powell's translation renders the Homeric Greek with a simplicity and dignity reminiscent of the original. Lucid and fast, the text immediately engrosses the reader, with a tight and balanced rhythm that sings and with a closeness to the original that allows the reader to hear the incantatory repetitions in the Greek. More accessible than Lattimore, more poetic than Lombardo, and more accurate than Fagles or Fitzgerald, this translation is an excellent fit for today's students and general readers. With swift, transparent language that rings both ancient and modern, Barry Powell gives readers anew all of the rage, pleasure, pathos, and humor that are Homer's Iliad. His clever translation is simple and energetic: sometimes coarse, sometimes flowing, it is always poetically engaged. Powell lays bare the semantic background of Homer through felicitous phrasing and delivers us a Dark-Age epic, one more suggestive of Norse sagas than the cultural milieu of archaic Ionia. Both the translation and the introduction are consistently informed by the best recent scholarship. The illustrations are well chosen, the maps precise, the notes brief but helpful.