As Daniel Mendelsohn wrote in The New Yorker (October 31, 2011), after noting that it took Pope seven years to complete his volume: "Many consider it the greatest English Iliad, and one of the greatest translations of any work into English. It manages to convey not only the stateliness and grandeur of Homer's lines, but their speed and wit and vividness."

"For every death there is a pocket biography, giving each fallen soldier a dignity and grace. Every warrior's life matters, no matter how small or far down the order of battle. When stripped of its hallowed reputation and viewed in the light of this barbaric age, where a mass shooting and a beheading with a chainsaw have become too commonplace, The Iliad represents a war story still relevant and meaningful. This is not the work for a specialist audience, but for all humanity." - Karl Wolff, New York Journal of Books