Choose Fagles if you want the Odyssey to sing — dramatic, propulsive, alive on the tongue. Choose Lattimore if you want to stand as close to Homer's Greek as English allows. It depends on what kind of homecoming you're after.
Read Fagles if you want a swift, stirring, read-it-in-a-weekend epic that rewards the ear and pulls you across the wine-dark sea.
Read Lattimore if you want fidelity above flourish — the contours of the Greek, line for line, for study or for closeness to the source.
Robert Fagles (1933–2008) taught English and comparative literature at Princeton, and came to Homer as a poet first. His 1996 Odyssey (Viking, with a long introduction by Bernard Knox) followed his acclaimed Iliad (1990) and preceded his Aeneid (2006). He set out to make the poem speak — to recover the rhapsode's voice, the bard performing to a hall, so the epic moves and breathes for a modern listener.
Richmond Lattimore (1906–1984) was a classicist and poet who taught Greek at Bryn Mawr for nearly five decades. His celebrated Iliad (1951) became the standard classroom translation almost overnight; his Odyssey arrived in 1965. His aim was the opposite pole of the same devotion: to mirror Homer faithfully, line for line, preserving the order, the epithets, and the long rolling rhythm of the Greek.
Nowhere is the difference clearer than in the first words to the Muse. Fagles begins: "Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists and turns…" Lattimore begins: "Tell me, Muse, of the man of many ways…" Two doors into the same hall.
Fagles chooses sing — and the verb is the whole argument. This is invocation as performance, the poet summoning the song aloud. "The man of twists and turns" renders Homer's polytropos as character and momentum at once: a hero bent and turned by the journey, the many-sided self folded back on itself.
Lattimore chooses tell, plainer and closer to the Greek's literal weight, and "the man of many ways" keeps polytropos nearer its root — many-pathed, many-turned, resisting a single shape. He lets the strangeness of the original stand rather than smoothing it into English drama.
Read them together and you have the choice in miniature. Fagles gives you the experience of the voyage; Lattimore gives you the map of the Greek beneath it. Neither is wrong about Odysseus — the man of many turnings is, fittingly, a figure no single rendering can hold.
| Robert Fagles | Richmond Lattimore | |
|---|---|---|
| Form / meter | Free verse, long rolling ~6-beat line | Loose six-beat line echoing the hexameter |
| Tone | Grand, dramatic, rhapsodic | Restrained, dignified, austere |
| Fidelity to the Greek | Faithful in spirit, freer in phrasing | Famously literal, line-for-line, keeps epithets |
| For a first-timer | High — swift and gripping | Moderate — can read as craggy at first |
| Best for | General readers, performance, momentum | Students, scholars, close study |
| Best read… | Aloud | Silently, alongside the Greek |
| Year | 1996 | 1965 |
First-time readers — Fagles. The drama, pace, and music carry you through 24 books without strain — the surest path to actually finishing and loving the poem.
Students & scholars — Lattimore. Its line-for-line fidelity and preserved epithets let you track the Greek and cite with confidence — long a classroom standard for good reason.
Listeners & reading aloud — Fagles, decisively. It was built for the speaking voice, and the celebrated Ian McKellen audiobook proves how naturally it performs.
Closeness to the original — Lattimore. Few English translations stay nearer Homer's word order, rhythm, and formulaic texture; this is the whole point of his version.
See how all the major versions stack up by reader type, or start with our recommended translation and the short companion first.
Compare every Odyssey translation →
Is Lattimore hard to read?
Harder than Fagles, but not forbidding. Its literal phrasing and inverted word order can feel craggy at first, yet the long line settles into a stately rhythm once you adjust.
Which is more accurate?
Lattimore, in the strict sense — it tracks the Greek line for line and keeps Homer's repeated epithets. Fagles is faithful to meaning and spirit while taking more freedom with phrasing for dramatic effect.
Which is better for students?
Lattimore when the goal is studying Homer closely or working beside the Greek. Fagles is the better choice if the assignment is to read and respond to the story as literature.
Which is better for a first read?
Fagles. Its momentum and voice make the Odyssey an experience rather than an exercise — the best way to first sail those waters and find your way home.