Homer on the Page.

The iambic pentameter line is only two-thirds as long as the dactylic hexameter, and in every line Wilson was forced to sacrifice Homer's detailing. Third, Wilson sought to match the Odyssey line for line: She wrote 12,110 verses for Homer's 12,110 verses. The New Yorker celebrated Wilson as the classicist who "made Homer modern" and stripped away "the tarnish of centuries" - rather an unusual thing to say about anyone translating 28-century-old poetry into iambic pentameters. BOOKS, ARTS & MANNERS ACHILLES, DETAIL OF GREEK VASE, FIFTH CENTURY B.C. BOOK REVIEW Homer on the Page JOHN BYRON KUHNER The Iliad, by Homer, translated by Emily Wilson (Norton, 848 pp., $39.95) The Iliad and the Odyssey have been translated into English again and again over the past several centuries, and about once every two decades a translator emerges as Homer's standard-bearer for a generation. [Extracted from the article]