The Iliad

By: Homer

Narrated by: Barnaby Edwards

A timeless epic of war, wrath, and the will of the gods.

In the heat of the Trojan War, the Greek army’s greatest warrior, Achilles, withdraws from battle after a bitter dispute with King Agamemnon. As the war spirals into chaos, heroes rise and fall, divine forces meddle in mortal affairs, and honor is tested on every side. But when tragedy strikes, Achilles must confront his rage—and his destiny.

The Iliad is a gripping exploration of glory and grief, love and loss, in a world where even the strongest are at the mercy of fate. This ancient masterpiece still speaks with urgent power to modern listeneres, reminding us what it means to fight, to suffer, and to be human.

Translated by W. H. D. Rouse. Read by Barnaby Edwards.

Public Domain (P)2025 SNR Audio

Great reading, great prose translation

Barnaby Edwards gives a crisp, clear, energetic reading of my favorite prose translation of The Iliad, the one by WHD Rouse. It’s hard to describe the curious mixture of breezy dialogue and occasional older dialect that I find so delightful. It begins, “An angry man: there is my story” — on the one hand, cutting out the Muse, but on the other hand starting the translation with the same word Homer used: Anger. It helps to know the variety of ways someone can be designated a “son of”: Zeus, son of Cronos, for example, is sometimes Zeus, sometimes Cronion, sometimes Cronides, sometimes just God, and sometimes Zeus Cloudgatherer — one of Rouse’s ways of including Homeric epithets. Athena is sometimes Athenaea. Apollo is Apollo Shootafar. The other thing that could be disorienting at first, if you’re not familiar with the idiom, is the phrase “good-father” or “good-sister” for “father-in-law” or “sister-in-law”. I’ve read many translations of Homer for enrichment, but this is one I’ve read, and will listen to, over and over again for sheer enjoyment.