Both are superb modern verse, so the real question is the voice you want. Choose Emily Wilson if you want Homer swift, clear, and disciplined; choose Robert Fagles if you want him grand, sweeping, and spoken aloud. Wilson gives you a steady, modern line; Fagles gives you the bard at full volume.
Read Wilson if you want the most modern, swift, and even-paced Iliad — regular pentameter you can move right through.
Read Fagles if you want the full dramatic swell of epic, the version classrooms have trusted for decades.
Emily Wilson is a classics professor at the University of Pennsylvania whose 2017 Odyssey — the first complete English Odyssey published by a woman — became a phenomenon. Her 2023 Iliad (Norton) applies the same discipline: she holds herself to the original's length, matching it line for line, and renders the poem in iambic pentameter, the native meter of English verse from Shakespeare to Keats. The result is plain, propulsive, and unmistakably modern. (For the Iliad specifically, the first complete English translation by a woman was Caroline Alexander's, in 2015.)
Robert Fagles (1933–2008) was a Princeton scholar and one of the rare translators to carry all three great epics into English — the Iliad, the Odyssey, and Virgil's Aeneid. His 1990 Iliad (Viking/Penguin), introduced by the classicist Bernard Knox, runs in long, loose, unrhymed lines of roughly six beats. He set out for grandeur and music: a Homer that sounds like a bard performing, not a text being read.
Homer's first word is menin, "wrath" — and each translator's first line is the whole translation in miniature.
Wilson opens: "Goddess, sing of the cataclysmic wrath / of great Achilles, son of Peleus…" It is a clean, single line of pentameter — controlled, modern, and forward-moving, with "cataclysmic" doing the work of magnifying the wrath without raising the voice. It signals her whole project: discipline, clarity, momentum.
Fagles opens: "Rage — Goddess, sing the rage of Peleus' son Achilles, / murderous, doomed, that cost the Achaeans countless losses…" He hurls the word Rage to the front and lets the line expand and roll, repeating and heightening. It signals his project too: grand, performative, built for the speaking voice.
So the choice is between two doors into the same fury. Wilson keeps the threshold clean and even so you walk straight in; Fagles raises an arch over it so you feel you are entering something vast. Neither is more "Homeric" — the Greek is at once compressed and overwhelming, and each has chosen which truth to carry across.
| Emily Wilson | Robert Fagles | |
|---|---|---|
| Form / meter | Iambic pentameter (regular five-beat line) | Free verse, long loose lines (~6 beats) |
| Tone | Plain, direct, modern, even-paced | Grand, rhapsodic, performative |
| Line economy | Line-for-line with the Greek | Expansive; runs noticeably longer |
| For a first-timer | Very high — clear and steady | Very high — dramatic and gripping |
| Closeness to the Greek's feel | Its speed and compression | Its grandeur and oral force |
| Best read… | Silently or aloud; great audiobook | Aloud — built for the speaking voice |
| Year | 2023 | 1990 |
First-time readers — either; Wilson for pace, Fagles for drama. Both are modern and clear. Wilson's steady pentameter keeps you moving evenly; Fagles's bigger voice pulls you through on sheer momentum.
Students & classrooms — leaning Fagles by tradition. Fagles has been assigned for decades and pairs with Bernard Knox's rich introduction; Wilson is increasingly taught for accessibility and her illuminating notes. Check which your syllabus expects.
Listeners & reading aloud — Fagles (Wilson a close second). His rolling lines were built for performance; Wilson's tighter meter also reads aloud cleanly and her audiobook is well received.
Readers who want it to feel contemporary — Wilson. Nothing among the major Iliads sounds more like it was written now.
If you're new to the poem, start with our recommended translation and read the short companion first — it makes either version easier to follow.
See our recommended Iliad →
Is Wilson or Fagles more accurate?
Neither is simply "more accurate" — both are serious classicists. Wilson matches the Greek line for line in strict pentameter, hewing to its length and compression; Fagles takes more freedom to heighten the drama. They make different, equally defensible choices.
Which is easier to read?
Both are highly readable modern English. Wilson's lines are short and regular, which keeps the story moving; Fagles is richer and more expansive — dramatic, but a little denser.
Is Wilson's Iliad good?
Yes — a clear, swift, disciplined verse Iliad and an excellent first read. Its reception has been more divided than her Odyssey, mainly over how the steady pentameter handles the battle scenes, but for readability it stands with the best.
Which is better for students?
Fagles has the longer classroom track record and Knox's introduction, so it's on more syllabi; Wilson is increasingly taught for accessibility and her notes. Usually it's whichever your course assigns.