The Iliad: A New Translation by Caroline Alexander
About this ebook
Composed around 730 B.C., Homer’s Iliad recounts the events of a few momentous weeks in the protracted ten-year military war between the invading Achaeans, or Greeks, and the Trojans in their besieged city of Ilion. From the explosive confrontation between Achilles, the greatest warrior at Troy, and Agamemnon, the inept leader of the Greeks, through to its tragic conclusion, this foundational work of ancient Greek literature explores the abiding, blighting facts of war.
Soldier and civilian, victor and vanquished, hero and coward, men, women, young, old—The Iliad evokes in poignant, searing detail the fate of every life ravaged by the Battle of Troy. And, as told by Homer, this ancient epic of a particular Bronze Age conflict becomes a sublime and sweeping evocation of the destruction of war throughout the ages.
Carved close to the original Greek, acclaimed classicist Caroline Alexander’s new English translation is swift and lean, with the driving cadence of its source—a Homeric epic in scale and yet devastating in its precision and power.
This essential translation of the foundational ancient epic offers:
- A New Translation: Experience the Trojan War through the eyes of acclaimed classicist Caroline Alexander, whose swift and lean prose is carved close to the original Homeric Greek.
- The Wrath of Achilles: Witness the explosive confrontation between the godlike warrior Achilles and the Greek leader Agamemnon—a bitter feud that changes the course of the war.
- Greek Mythology: Enter a world of gods and mortals, where the fates of soldiers, civilians, victors, and vanquished are tangled in a devastating conflict.
- Ancient Poetry: Discover the power of Homer's enduring Bronze Age masterpiece, a sublime and sweeping evocation of the destruction of war that resonates through the ages.
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About the author
Although recognized as one of the greatest ancient Greek poets, the life and figure of Homer remains shrouded in mystery. Credited with the authorship of the epic poems Iliad and Odyssey, Homer, if he existed, is believed to have lived during the ninth century BC, and has been identified variously as a Babylonian, an Ithacan, or an Ionian. Regardless of his citizenship, Homer’s poems and speeches played a key role in shaping Greek culture, and Homeric studies remains one of the oldest continuous areas of scholarship, reaching from antiquity through to modern times.
Caroline Alexander is the author of the international bestsellers The Endurance and The Bounty and, more recently, The War That Killed Achilles: The True Story of the Trojan War. She is a contributing writer for National Geographic magazine and her work has also appeared in The New Yorker, Smithsonian, and Outside, among other publications. Alexander received her doctorate in classics from Columbia University and was the founder of the Department of Classics at the University of Malawi in East Africa.
