Deft ... The most interesting question about Wilson’s new translation is not whether hers is a feminist Iliad (however this is defined) but whether it is the definitive Iliad for our times. My answer is yes ... Wilson has forged a poetic style in English that captures the essence of Homeric Greek ... On the page the metricality of Wilson’s verse is lost — the rhythm comes alive only when you read aloud, the words whistling up the windpipe, animating the tongue and striking the ear. No other translation communicates the oral nature of the poem so brilliantly ... Another key element in Wilson’s style is the register, poised between the high epic and the everyday. Her tone manages a sweeping grandeur without pomposity, and is both refreshingly modern and largely free of the jarring chattiness of contemporary colloquialisms ... Highly readable ... A genuine page-turner, and it is all too easy to gallop through it as one would a beach read.

Stirring ... Whips and crackles beneath the familiar meter of loose iambic pentameter. Wilson tells it all in plain English, to elegant effect ... She deftly coaxes the original’s Dactylic hexameters into our own accentual tongue. We feel her joy, birthed by hard labor ... Wilson’s vibes with contemporary irony and idioms ... There’s a note of grace amid the grief, a hard-won wisdom — how modern is that? With both Homeric epics Wilson has pulled off a thrilling achievement.

Propulsive ... Wilson’s translation of Homeric Greek is always buoyant and expressive. There are occasional slips in register that seem a little out of place ... But Wilson wants this version to be read aloud, and it would certainly be fun to perform.

An Iliad for the masses, written in English verse legible to people who do not normally read verse. Some readers expecting Disney will find themselves ankle-deep in viscera ... Little is known about Homer—whether he was one man or many, whether he was blind, whether he had a scribe—but we can be sure he didn’t pause with his audience to mull word choice. Wilson doesn’t either. Her choices do not call attention to themselves. They let the poem proceed ... [Wilson's] characters speak not like orotund Shakespeare imitators but like people talking in their native languages and registers. Wilson’s language does not challenge anyone’s idea of what English can be ... One can’t reasonably expect a mere book to deliver such vivid evocations of a blood culture. The next best thing is to make the text flow, to make the story proceed, and to conserve as much as possible of the direct, savage beauty of Homer. That will help a new generation understand why for thousands of years, readers have discovered that time spent reading Homer is never wasted or regretted. The original text will still retain its awful secrets.

Naturally, Wilson’s admirers hoped that her second Homeric translation would be as great an achievement as the first. What they might not have expected is that it would be better. Like her Odyssey, Wilson’s Iliad is crafted in language that is accessible without being modish, and elegant in its brightness and clarity. She continues to render Homeric hexameter into English pentameter, and this translation, too, pulses with a beat that is perceptible but not distracting. Once again, she has also set enough buoys to help first-time readers navigate and stay afloat: the introduction is informative, incisive, and modern; the notes are extensive; the glossary of names a great help ... Emily Wilson has not only produced fresh and limpid new translations of two foundational ancient poems. She has also given a new generation of readers the tools to approach Homer, with comfort and confidence, for the very first time. For those who knew the poems already, she lets Homer speak to them in a new voice.

Reads very well, even the rather technical wounding, and the metre mostly holds up. There are many omissions, but none seriously affecting meaning. After all, it’s the readability for those who do not know Greek that counts ... Wilson’s introduction and helpful notes to the text (at the back) usher in a wide range of technical, historical, cultural and literary issues ... One does not read Homer for commentary on modern sensibilities ... Wilson can take much pride in her successful contributions to this mighty stream and in making us think again about our cultural debts and educational responsibilities.

Arguably the most radical thing about the translation was that it conveyed the Greek in a strict iambic pentameter ... The translation is uncompromisingly metrical, strongly rhythmic and designed to be read and heard aloud, but Wilson has allowed herself to expand beyond the line-for-line scheme of her Odyssey ... Wilson achieves her register – at once plain spoken and slightly removed from everyday speech – partly by studiously avoiding contractions and allowing for metrically convenient epicisms ... I have to say that for all that I enjoyed her Odyssey, I have been even more absorbed by her Iliad.

Stands out because her command of ancient Greek vocabulary, dialects, metres and even the manuscript tradition lends authority to every aesthetic decision she has made ... She has provided exceptionally rich resources for the reader, whether with previous knowledge of Homer or none: maps, a glossary, genealogies and 100 pages of explanatory notes. But her learning would count for little if the translation itself did not seduce with its crystalline clarity, elegance, sensuality, sometimes breathless pace and above all emotional clout ... Of course, there are places where I personally would have preferred a different choice ... Dynamic.

A bloody tale of ancient war and grief comes to vibrant life in modern-day English ... Wilson has again presented a Homer that sings, in sprightly iambic pentameter and pellucid language that avoids ponderosities ... A masterful, highly readable rendering of the Greek classic.