Mitchell writes in verse, Rouse in prose, and this shapes every line. Mitchell keeps a loose but recognizable rhythm: "Men come and go, just like the leaves in their seasons" has a natural forward pull without forcing a strict meter. His diction is contemporary and mostly plain. Rouse reads faster, in short declarative units: "Leaves fall when the breezes blow, in the springtime others grow" briefly rhymes, an unusual move in a prose version. His register shifts around. In the Book 5 passage, he gives Athena the phrase "Mr. Facing-all-ways," which is colloquial almost to the point of comedy. Mitchell's Athena calls Ares "a brazen and two-faced liar," which is direct but stays in a neutral modern register. The gap between those two phrases is wide. Rouse (1938) aims at readability above all, and the Book 21 killing shows what that costs: he gives the scene in plain sentences that move quickly but drop the physical detail of Achilles driving the sword through to the collarbone. Mitchell restores that specificity. His opening, "The rage of Achilles, sing it now, goddess, sing through me," keeps the Greek word order and the direct address to the goddess, where Rouse opens with "An angry man" and a conversational aside ("There is my story") that shifts the narrator closer to the reader. Rouse's approach gives a reader easy, uninterrupted access to the plot. Mitchell's gives more of the texture of a poem that knows it is performing itself.
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.
An angry man—There is my story: The bitter rancour of Achillês, prince of the house of Peleus, which brought a thousand troubles upon the Achaian host. Many a strong soul it sent down to Hadês, and left the heroes themselves a prey to dogs and carrion birds, while the will of God moved on to fulfilment.
It began first of all with a quarrel between my lord King Agamemnon of Atreus' line and the Prince Achillês.