Fagles writes in free verse, which means lines vary in length and carry natural speech stress without a fixed meter. Murray writes in continuous prose. The difference is audible from the opening words: Fagles leads with "Rage" as a single word before the comma, forcing a pause, while Murray opens with "The wrath sing, goddess," keeping the inverted syntax of the Greek but spreading it flat across a sentence. Fagles uses contemporary, sometimes colloquial register, calling Ares "manic" and "double-dealing, lying two-face god" in Book 5, phrases that feel pulled from ordinary speech. Murray stays in a formal, somewhat archaic register throughout, using constructions like "fear thou not" and "so present a helper am I to thee." Neither register is neutral: one pulls the poem toward the present, the other holds it at a ceremonial distance. Murray's translation dates to 1924 and prioritizes close fidelity to the Greek syntax and vocabulary, staying near the word order and retaining epithets and formulaic phrases without much reshaping. The Book 9 passage shows this: Murray renders the choice plainly, "lost is my home-return, but my renown shall be imperishable," which tracks the Greek structure directly. What he removes is rhythmic urgency. Fagles adds line breaks and repetition, "my pride, my glory dies . . . true, but the life that's left me will be long," building toward performance on the page. What Fagles removes is some of the literal content: he compresses and occasionally paraphrases where Murray glosses. A reader wanting the Greek argument intact gains more from Murray; a reader wanting the emotional arc in English gains more from Fagles.
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.
The wrath sing, goddess, of Peleus' son, Achilles, that destructive wrath which brought countless woes upon the Achaeans, and sent forth to Hades many valiant souls of heroes, and made them themselves spoil for dogs and every bird; thus the plan of Zeus came to fulfillment, from the time when first they parted in strife Atreus' son, king of men, and brilliant Achilles.