Which version/translation of the Iliad should I read?

Question

I started reading a really bad translation kept in the epic poem style, and started looking over the descriptive translated version. I really disliked the epic style one because the translation was clumsy and obviously close to Victorian in style. But the descriptive one seems to lack something of the repetitive verse and the language of the Odyssey. Do you think there's a better-crafted translation in the epic poem style, or should I stick with the descriptive storytelling style?

I really don't know which version I read, but it wasn't really current I don't think. The one I own in descriptive is a Penguin one translated by E.V. Rieu.

Then, which one do *you* prefer?

Answer 1

Better tell us which translations you have read so we dont all repeat ourselves?

I 've read the old Penguin Classics version but not the new 1980s one.

There are so many different possible translation styles when you're trying to change a epic poem written in hexameters about 1000 B.C. in Homeric/ Aeolic Greek into modern 21st century English prose!

Answer 2

I am intermittently reading the Aeneid translated by Knox and Fagles. It's very readable. They have a translation of the Iliad, too, although I haven't read it.

Answer 3

One of the best descriptive translated versions is by E.V.Rieu published by Penguins, revised and updated by D.C.H. Rieu (his son) and Peter Jones.

Answer 4

it dipens on wich translation u are reading and what kind of book is that.
u writ what kind of book is that and i tell u what should u do and wich translation is the best.
send me im