Lattimore writes in a long, loose hexameter line that often runs past natural speech rhythm, giving his version a formal, slightly archaic register. His opening reads "the anger of Peleus' son Achilleus / and its devastation," spreading the sentence across lines in a way that mimics the Greek's own forward momentum. The word "devastation" is his own interpretive addition, not a close rendering of the Greek "oulomenen" (ruinous, accursed). Alexander works in a shorter, more varied line and opens by pulling "Wrath" to the front, alone, before the verb arrives. Her phrase "wrath of Peleus' son Achilles" is compact and direct. In the Book 21 exchange, Lattimore gives "how huge, how splendid," while Alexander writes "how magnificent and mighty," choosing words with more contemporary weight. Lattimore, working in the mid-twentieth century, aimed to reproduce something of the formulaic, oral texture of Homeric Greek, keeping epithets intact and preserving the sense of a poem composed for recitation. The result sometimes feels ceremonial and at distance from everyday speech. Alexander, publishing in 2015, prioritizes close correspondence to the Greek line by line. In Book 6's leaves simile, Lattimore adds "live timber" with no Greek equivalent, while Alexander keeps her rendering tighter: "the forest grows others / that flourish." Lattimore's addition gives a sensory image the Greek lacks. In Book 9, both translations carry Achilles' two-fate speech accurately, but Lattimore's longer lines let the choice between glory and life breathe across more space, while Alexander delivers it in a slightly compressed form that keeps the logic sharp.
Sing, goddess, the anger of Peleus' son Achilleus
and its devastation, which puts pains thousandfold upon the Achaians,
hurled in their multitudes to the house of Hades strong souls
of heroes, but gave their bodies to be the delicate feasting
of dogs, of all birds, and the will of Zeus was accomplished
since that time when first there stood in division of conflict
Atreus' son the lord of men and brilliant Achilleus.
Wrath—sing, goddess, of the ruinous wrath of Peleus' son Achilles,
that inflicted woes without number upon the Achaeans,
hurled forth to Hades many strong souls of warriors
and rendered their bodies prey for the dogs,
for all birds, and the will of Zeus was accomplished;
sing from when they two first stood in conflict—
Atreus' son, lord of men, and godlike Achilles.