The Iliad

Declare, O Muse! in what ill-fated hour Sprung the fierce strife, from what offended power Latona's son a dire contagion spread, And heap'd the camp with mountains of the dead; The king of men his reverent priest defied, And for the king's offence the people died.

Wrath of Achilles through Patroclus's death, Hector's slaying, and Priam's supplication compresses a single arc into weeks with structural unity, so plot scores 90.

Jupiter sends Thetis to Achilles, to dispose him for the restoring it, and Iris to Priam, to encourage him to go in person and treat for it. The old king, notwithstanding the remonstrances of his queen, makes ready for the journey, to which he is encouraged by an omen from Jupiter.

Achilles, Hector, Agamemnon, Priam, and partisan gods form types fixed for Western literature, so cast scores 93.

Neptune, concerned for the loss of the Grecians, upon seeing the fortification forced by Hector, (who had entered the gate near the station of the Ajaces,) assumes the shape of Calchas, and inspires those heroes to oppose him.

Twenty-four books of battle catalogues repeat arming and slaughter patterns before Books XVIII–XXIV accelerate to Hector's ransoming, so pace scores 78.

Declare, O Muse! in what ill-fated hour Sprung the fierce strife, from what offended power Latona's son a dire contagion spread, And heap'd the camp with mountains of the dead.

Pope's heroic couplets give the Iliad English verse grandeur even where they depart from literal Greek, so prose scores 94.

In the war of Troy, the Greeks having sacked some of the neighbouring towns, and taken from thence two beautiful captives, Chryseïs and Briseïs, allotted the first to Agamemnon, and the last to Achilles.

Troy under siege, the Scaean gates, the Greek camp, and Olympus debating mortals form Bronze Age war as cosmic theatre where fate outweighs valour, so world scores 92.

Declare, O Muse! in what ill-fated hour Sprung the fierce strife, from what offended power Latona's son a dire contagion spread, And heap'd the camp with mountains of the dead; The king of men his reverent priest defied, And for the king's offence the people died.

Book I opens on plague and the Agamemnon-Achilles quarrel after nine years—the hero's withdrawal that will doom the Greeks, so hook scores 89.

which related the wrath of Achilles, with all its direful consequences, were so far superior to the rest of the poetic cycle, as to admit no rivalry

The wrath-plot as unified epic action, gods' parallel council, shield ekphrasis, and Priam's visit as tragic reversal—foundational template for war literature, so innov scores 95.

Then raised a mountain where his bones were burn'd, The mountain-nymphs the rural tomb adorn'd, Jove's sylvan daughters bade their elms bestow A barren shade, and in his honour grow.

Priam ransoms Hector's body and funeral rites close on grief transcending enmity though war continues, so ending scores 92.