Lombardo writes in spare, contemporary American English, with short lines and plain word choices that read close to speech. His Book 1 opening, "Black and murderous, that cost the Greeks," uses blunt adjectives and no archaic inflection. Chapman, writing in 1611, works in rhyming couplets with long, end-stopped lines and Elizabethan syntax. His opening gives "many brave souls loos'd / From breasts heroic," which is dense and ceremonial. The registers sit far apart. Lombardo's Achilles in Book 21 says "You die too, friend. Don't take it hard," a line that could come from a modern novel. Chapman's equivalent runs into subordinate clauses and rhetorical address, giving the same moment a formal, elevated weight that signals a performance meant partly for reading aloud. Lombardo's approach puts readability first: he removes epithets, trims repetition, and lets dialogue move fast. This gains speed and immediacy, but it removes texture that Homer's original audience would have recognized as functional, not decorative. Chapman prioritizes a kind of ceremonial fullness. In Book 9, his Achilles says "death shall linger his approach, and I live many days," which keeps the slow, balanced rhythm of the Greek meditation on fate. Lombardo compresses the same lines into five clean statements with no equivalent rhetorical weight. Chapman occasionally obscures meaning through his syntax, as in the Book 6 leaves passage, where "Man's leavy issue" takes effort to parse. Lombardo's version of the same passage is plain and quick, which makes it accessible and removes the strangeness Homer likely intended.
Sing, Goddess, Achilles' rage,
Black and murderous, that cost the Greeks
Incalculable pain, pitched countless souls
Of heroes into Hades' dark,
And left their bodies to rot as feasts
For dogs and birds, as Zeus' will was done.
Achilles' baneful wrath resound, O Goddess, that impos'd
Infinite sorrows on the Greeks, and many brave souls loos'd
From breasts heroic; sent them far to that invisible cave
That no light comforts; and their limbs to dogs and vultures gave:
To all which Jove's will gave effect; from whom first strife begun
Betwixt Atrides, king of men, and Thetis' godlike son.