The Anger of Achilles: The Iliad

Description

Robert Graves's gripping, vigorous retelling of The Iliad takes a revered classic back to its roots as popular entertainment War is raging between the Greeks and the Trojans. Achilles, the great warrior champion of the Greek army, is angrily sulking in his tent and refusing to fight, after a row with his leader Agamemnon. But when the Trojan king Hector kills Achilles' beloved friend, he plunges back into the battle to seek his bloody revenge - even though he knows it will bring about his own doom. Robert Graves's gripping, vigorous retelling of The Iliad portrays quarrelling kings and tarnished heroes, who leave suffering women behind them and are watched over by capricious gods and goddesses. It takes a revered classic back to its roots as popular entertainment.

Robert Graves was born in 1895 in Wimbledon. He went from school to the First World War, where he became a captain in the Royal Welch Fusiliers and was seriously wounded at the Battle of the Somme. He wrote his autobiography, Goodbye to All That, in 1929, and it was soon established as a modern classic. He died on 7 December 1985 in Majorca, his home since 1929.