However, this time out I read a different translation and though it was still largely the awesome feat of literature that I recall, I realized that this particular translation, by WHD Rouse, had, in spots, sapped a portion of the lyrical quality out of the prose. Is there anything you would change about this book? This isn’t my first reading of Homer’s Iliad, which recounts the legendary assault of the Achaeans on the City of Troy. Their value lies chiefly in the poetry itself, moving from sublime passages about the gods and heroic exploits to passages expressing deep human emotion. Most scholars believe he composed the Iliad and the Odyssey by relying on oral traditions. Virtually nothing is known about his life. Homer (9th or 8th century B.C.) is the presumed author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, the two greatest epic poems of ancient Greece. Though the stormy god of the ocean has sworn vengeance against him, and witches and sirens try to lure him off course, Odysseus is clever and has the brilliant goddess Athena on his side. The Odyssey chronicles the many trials and adventures Odysseus must pass through on his long journey home from the Trojan wars to his beloved wife. Driven by fierce passions and loyalties, men and gods battle to a devastating conclusion. The terrible and long-drawn-out siege of Troy remains one of the classic campaigns, the heroism and treachery of its combatants unmatched in song and story. The Iliad can justly be called the world’s greatest war epic. Though more than 2,700 years old, their stories of brave heroics, capricious gods, and towering human emotions are vividly timeless. Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey are unquestionably two of the greatest epic masterpieces in Western literature.
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