Mitchell writes in a fairly regular verse line that reads close to contemporary literary prose, with measured pacing and no archaic vocabulary. In the opening lines, he opens with "The rage of Achilles" and moves through the invocation in clean, forward-moving sentences, cutting the epithets and genealogical markers that Homer stacks at the start. Johnston's opening, "Sing, Goddess, sing the rage of Achilles, son of Peleus," keeps the repeated imperative and restores the patronymic, giving the line a more ceremonial feel. Johnston's verse is freer and shorter, often breaking where breath falls naturally. In the leaves passage, Mitchell writes "Men come and go, just like the leaves in their seasons," a full clause with a simile built in, while Johnston writes "Generations of men are like the leaves," plainer and more compressed. Mitchell's stated aim is a readable, swift-moving poem for modern audiences, and he removes epithets, condenses apostrophes, and keeps sentences long enough to carry momentum. In the Achilles speech on fate (Book 9), he cuts the qualifier "silver-footed Thetis" and moves straight into the choice, which speeds the argument. Johnston keeps "silver-footed Thetis" and names the two fates more explicitly, staying closer to the Greek line by line. That fidelity to detail costs some drive but gives a reader more of the texture Homer puts on the page. In the killing scene (Book 21), both translations are close and direct, but Johnston's short declarative sentences ("Yet over me, as well, hangs Fate") leave more space around each phrase, while Mitchell absorbs the same thought into a longer periodic sentence.
The rage of Achilles—sing it now, goddess, sing through me
the deadly rage that caused the Achaeans such grief
and hurled down to Hades the souls of so many fighters,
leaving their naked flesh to be eaten by dogs
and carrion birds, as the will of Zeus was accomplished.
Begin at the time when bitter words first divided
that king of men, Agamemnon, and godlike Achilles.
Sing, Goddess, sing the rage of Achilles, son of Peleus—
that murderous anger which condemned Achaeans
to countless agonies and threw many warrior souls
deep into Hades, leaving their dead bodies
carrion food for dogs and birds—
all in fulfilment of the will of Zeus.