Alexander Pope's translation of the Iliad is renowned for its elegant and poetic style, capturing the grandeur and drama of Homer's epic with a classical flair that was highly appreciated in the 18th century. Unlike more modern translations that aim for directness and literal accuracy, Pope's version employs a rhymed couplet form, which adds a musical quality that emphasizes the heroic and tragic elements of the story. Pope's choice of language often reflects the ornate and elevated English of his own time, which some readers find adds a certain majesty and others see as distancing the work from the original's immediacy. Compared to translations like those by Richmond Lattimore or Robert Fagles, which focus more on fidelity to the original Greek text and clarity, Pope's Iliad is more an artistic interpretation, allowing the translator’s own voice to shine through as he portrayed the wrath of Achilles and the will of the gods with dramatic flourish and vivid imagery.
Achilles' wrath, to Greece the direful spring
Of woes unnumbered, heavenly goddess, sing!
That wrath which hurled to Pluto's gloomy reign
The souls of mighty chiefs untimely slain;
Whose limbs, unburied on the naked shore,
Devouring dogs and hungry vultures tore.
Since great Achilles and Atrides strove,
Such was the sovereign doom, and such the will of Jove!