Fagles writes in free verse with variable line lengths and a contemporary register that occasionally tips into the colloquial. His opening word, "Rage," lands alone before the goddess is even named, a choice that has no direct Greek warrant but puts the emotion front and center immediately. His Athena in Book 5 calls Ares a "manic, born for disaster, double-dealing, lying two-face god," stacking adjectives in a way that reads as modern American English rather than ancient epic. The rhythm is energetic and speech-like, built for a reader who wants momentum. Jordan writes in a more measured verse, with lines that tend to stay closer to the Greek line count. His register is elevated but not archaic: "a frenzied two-faced pest since he was born" is plain without being casual, and his Book 6 leaf simile, "Wind scatters leaves on the ground, yet the forest / prospers and leafs again when spring returns," moves cleanly without the rhetorical flourish Fagles adds. Jordan puts fidelity to the Greek structure first. His Book 9 passage gives Achilles' two fates in a near-complete form: "if I stay and fight around the Trojan city / I will die soon but my fame will never die, / yet if I return home to my fatherland / I will forfeit glory, but gain long life." The parallelism mirrors the Greek antithesis closely. Fagles cuts the second branch, ending on "the stroke of death will not come on me quickly," which is rhetorically shapelier but drops the explicit trade-off. In Book 21, Fagles ends Achilles' speech before the moment of death's arrival ("death and the strong force of fate are waiting"), while Jordan continues through "a flying spear or arrow loosed from his string," staying with the Greek for two more lines. Fagles gains punch; Jordan gains completeness.
Rage—Goddess, sing the rage of Peleus' son Achilles,
murderous, doomed, that cost the Achaeans countless losses,
hurling down to the House of Death so many sturdy souls,
great fighters' souls, but made their bodies carrion,
feasts for the dogs and birds,
and the will of Zeus was moving toward its end.
Sing, goddess, of Peleus' son Achilles' anger,
ruinous, that caused the Greeks untold ordeals,
consigned to Hades countless valiant souls,
heroes, and left their bodies prey for dogs
or feast for vultures. Zeus's will was done
from when those two first quarreled and split apart,
the king, Agamemnon, and matchless Achilles.