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From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Baricco made his name internationally with his debut, Silk (1997), and has since released three more well-received novels, most recently the war-themed Without Blood (2004). This prose retelling of the Iliad is sure to top them all. Baricco eliminates the appearances of the gods, adds an ending chapter (borrowed from the Odyssey) that recounts the famous incident of the wooden horse and the sack of Troy and—an ingenious touch—tells the story from the first-person viewpoint of various participants: Odysseus, Thersites, Nestor, Achilles. The famed physicality and violence of the poem are here ("the bronze tip... cut the tongue cleanly at the base, came out through the neck"), and Baricco doesn't sentimentalize the story—easy to do, especially with Helen. The larger plot remains: Agamemnon insults Achilles, the best warrior on the Achaean (Greek) side, who then refuses to further serve, which allows the Trojans to rally under their greatest warrior, King Priam's son, Hector. Achilles' best friend, Patroclus, receives Achilles' permission to help the Greeks, but is killed in battle. Achilles returns to the battlefield, succeeds in isolating Hector underneath the walls of Troy and strikes him down. Finally, Priam goes to Achilles' tent and begs for the body of his son, and Achilles grants his return. Medieval versions of the Iliad story conceived it in chivalrous terms, but Baricco conveys the real story, an epic of harsh dealings, small treacheries and large vanities. He adds only a few modern reflections to the character's thoughts: old Nestor, for instance, plays with the paradox that the young have an "old idea of war," which entails honor, beauty and glory, while the old take up new ways to fight simply in order to win. In an afterword, Baricco states that "this is not an ordinary time to read the Iliad," and his book is more than a pasteurized version of a great poem. It is a variation, and a very moving one, on timeless Homeric themes. (Aug.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
From Booklist
Baricco, the author of, among other highly regarded works, the shimmering novel ilk (1997), submits his own version, condensed from the original, of the classic epic poem he Iliad, and the result is a beguiling mixture of drama and prose poem. As he explains in the introduction, "I tried never to summarize but, rather, to create episodes that were more succinct while still made of portions of the original text. Thus the bricks are Homeric but the mortar and the resulting edifice are transformed." Updating a classic can be tricky, but Baricco's sensitive hands have wrought a dynamic, beautifully styled series of first-person testimonies from the major figures in the long-lasting Greek assault on the Asia Minor city of Troy, where the fair and absconded Helen lies in the arms of the godly handsome Paris. Familiarity with the original text is not essential for successfully experiencing this elegant depiction of warfare--yes, purely it is the story of war, with all the destruction concomitant to that situation; however, the characters achieve a remarkable individuality. Brad Hooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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Amazon.com:
4.3 out of 5 stars (10 customer reviews)
15 of 17 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
a truly bold reimagining: approach with an open mind, Aug 3 2006
By Jane, reading groupie - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: An Iliad (Hardcover)
I am as close to a Homer purist as you will find: BA and MA in classics. Of course this book is no substitute for Homer's original: that narrative defined all western standards for storytelling. But I must give Baricco the highest marks for crystalizing and presenting (quite powerfully) the elements of the Iliad that are still relevant to human circumstances. We no longer believe that a pantheon of gods intimately involve themselves in the lives of a few heroic figures. It is therefore the job of the modern interpreter to find the purely human motivations that haven't changed over the millennia. This Baricco has done superbly. The characters do not all sound alike, as the other reviewer claims: that's just wrong. As one who has studied Homer line by line in the original, I have as much reason in theory to be bored or unimpressed by this project. But I am not. It made me think about the original in a new way, and that's no small feat.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
a stong 4 stars from a baricco fan, Oct 22 2007
By Shawn Campbell "Digital creative. Recovering ... - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: An Iliad (Paperback)
I read this as a fan of Alessandro Baricco (ocean sea is a personal favorite). When I began reading I was surprised at the rhythm of the text, because it seemed quite different than the long flowing poetic sentences of Ocean Sea and Silk. Once I settled into his concise style, I appreciated the gruesome battles more than expected. In the end, I was introduced to a style and context of fiction literature that I was previously unfamiliar with. I would recommend the book to anyone interested in Greek Epics or warfare.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Immense and Powerful Yet Personal, Feb 2 2012
By J. Mckenna "Jim McKenna" - Published on Amazon.com
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This is not a translation of The Iliad as much as it a reimaging. We are presented with a view of the epic through a 21st century literary mirror. Baricco has taken a faithful interpretation of the epic (by Maria Grazia Ciani) and stripped away the intentional redundancies and the Gods and replaced it with deeply human voices without losing any of the depth, beauty or brutality of the original. This is a real accomplishment. I would not supplant THE Iliad for AN Iliad, but it is certainly a moving and wholly accurate experience for any reader.Go ahead and buy it, and you will return to it and give it to others for years to come.
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