The Iliad

"Wilsons translation runs as swift as a bloody river, teems with the clattering sounds of war, bursts with the warriors hunger for battle" -- Charlotte Higgins - The Guardian "Wilsons Iliad is clear and brisk, its iambic pentameter a zone of enchantment. " -- Ange Mlinko - London Review of Books "Superb... [a] beautiful, fluent, memorable translation" -- Rowan Williams - New Statesman "Seduce[s] with its crystalline clarity, elegance, sensuality, sometimes breathless pace and above all emotional clout." -- Edith Hall - The Guardian "A triumphant new translation of the Iliad... It's a poem you read with your heart in your throat. " -- A. E. Stallings - The Spectator "A propulsive road... an excellent translation" -- Natalie Haynes - BBC Culture "Sing, goddess, of the skill of Emily [Wilson]." -- Robbie Millen - The Times "Vitally urgent" -- Judith Thurman - The New Yorker "For the Greeks, Homer was the universal poet. He was likened to the ocean, circling the world, from which all cultural rivers flowed... Two thousand years later, those rivers still flow. Wilson can take much pride in her successful contribution to this mighty stream" -- Peter Jones - The Times "Emily Wilsons superb rendering of the Greek epic resounds with Miltonic echoes" -- The Telegraph "Emily Wilson's translation of the "Iliad" brings Homer's great war story to rousing new life....propulsive....buoyant and expressive. " -- Natalie Haynes - The New York Times Book Review "In Wilson's hands, the poem sings with the clash of bronze, the thundering of hooves, the savage holler of war-cries. Her use of iambic pentameter imbues it with irresistible pace and rhythm. It flows like music exhilarating, tragic, beautiful and stirring" -- Jennifer Saint - the i newspaper "Wilson is at her best when writing of the battlefield. As others have noted, she has a knack for the consonantal sounds of warfare Wilsons Iliad is always to the point." -- Kate Maltby - Financial Times "Wilson's translation is vivid, lucid, pacy... For those yet to encounter this violent, charming, disturbing, beautiful poem, now is the time." -- Katherine Backler - The Tablet "Excellent... [Wilson] achieves a fluid and consistent vision." -- Philip Womack - Spectator World "Wilson has forged a poetic style in English that captures the essence of Homeric Greek.Readable, relevant and from the heart, this is the Iliad we have all been waiting for, whether we knew it or not." -- Naose Mac Sweeny - The Washington Post "We should be grateful for Emily Wilson's luminous new translation of the Iliad... Wilson's edition should be compulsory reading for every statesperson and politicianespecially those seeking to make cheap capital out of our current tragedy... Read and be awedand afraid." -- Lyndsey Stonebridge - New Statesman "[Wilson] captures so brilliantly the fire and dread and bewilderment and rage of the poem. She wears her erudition beautifully: she matches it with such wit, precision and flair." -- Katherine Rundell "Emily Wilson's muscular and moving new translation is truly what it claims to be - a version for our time" -- Andrew Motion - The Spectator

Emily Wilson is a professor of classical studies at the University of Pennsylvania. She has been named a Fellow of the American Academy in Rome in Renaissance and early modern scholarship, a MacArthur Fellow, and a Guggenheim Fellow. In addition to Homers Iliad and Odyssey, she has also published translations of Sophocles, Euripides, and Seneca. She lives in Philadelphia.