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An Iliad
An Iliad
55 pages, Paperback
First published November 1, 2012
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 42 reviews
February 26, 2017
Scholars for centuries have debated whether Homer's Iliad is a pro- or anti-war epic. And it's a great discussion, because even though war is undeniably the thematic center of the work, glory and grief are both explored so fully that there's always going to be this unresolved ambiguity. Meanwhile Lisa Peterson and Denis O'Hare's theatrical adaptation An Iliad firmly takes a side and runs with it.
An Iliad is a one-man show, in which our narrator, 'The Poet,' tells the story of the Trojan War, focusing on the conflict between Achilles and Hector. Abbreviated with admirable succinctness, all major events that occur in the human realm in The Iliad are at least touched upon. But more than a simple retelling, Peterson and O'Hare take a story with a famously epic scope, and bring it down to a scale that we as a contemporary audience can engage with, imbuing it with intimate and tactile details which I imagine are only augmented while viewing it in its intended theatrical setting.
You could argue that there's a certain lack of subtlety in an anti-war polemic that takes up four entire pages relaying a list of every known major conflict in recorded history. But it's the immediacy of hearing (or reading) these words - the suffocating rhythm of the list and its fearlessness that really drives home the tension and horror and tragedy which exist both at the heart of the epic and at the heart of Peterson and O'Hare's vision. Wrought with inevitability as our weary narrator tells the story he's so familiar with, An Iliad is a piercing examination and condemnation of the horrors of war, and man's tendency toward conflict. A thought-provoking, faithful adaptation which honors the original story and embraces the unique conventions of its medium.
An Iliad is a one-man show, in which our narrator, 'The Poet,' tells the story of the Trojan War, focusing on the conflict between Achilles and Hector. Abbreviated with admirable succinctness, all major events that occur in the human realm in The Iliad are at least touched upon. But more than a simple retelling, Peterson and O'Hare take a story with a famously epic scope, and bring it down to a scale that we as a contemporary audience can engage with, imbuing it with intimate and tactile details which I imagine are only augmented while viewing it in its intended theatrical setting.
You could argue that there's a certain lack of subtlety in an anti-war polemic that takes up four entire pages relaying a list of every known major conflict in recorded history. But it's the immediacy of hearing (or reading) these words - the suffocating rhythm of the list and its fearlessness that really drives home the tension and horror and tragedy which exist both at the heart of the epic and at the heart of Peterson and O'Hare's vision. Wrought with inevitability as our weary narrator tells the story he's so familiar with, An Iliad is a piercing examination and condemnation of the horrors of war, and man's tendency toward conflict. A thought-provoking, faithful adaptation which honors the original story and embraces the unique conventions of its medium.
October 30, 2022
Absolutely breathtaking.
November 19, 2025
Rating: 3 stars
I liked this more than I thought I would. It’s a Trojan War retelling… sort of… but it’s an hour long monologue where this drunk dude talks about certain notable figures in the war like Achilles, Hector etc. The only thing that still baffles me is how you can remember that much uninterrupted dialogue. Eh, people gawk at all the details I can recall so I suppose it is not too far fetched.
I liked this more than I thought I would. It’s a Trojan War retelling… sort of… but it’s an hour long monologue where this drunk dude talks about certain notable figures in the war like Achilles, Hector etc. The only thing that still baffles me is how you can remember that much uninterrupted dialogue. Eh, people gawk at all the details I can recall so I suppose it is not too far fetched.
October 11, 2016
Maybe it's better to watch it than it is to read it, but man, this was painfully overwrought. Like being beaten over the head with a lecture about why war is bad. I don't know that it really added anything to The Iliad; the explication was obvious.
August 2, 2021
saw the play at APT and had to read it. simply stunning in it's capacity to stir the blood and move the heart. saw it again this year. it's like a magnet.
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December 12, 2025He’s a brave man, but deep down, he’d rather be taming horses.
didn’t realize at first that this was a one-man show and i expected to be a bit disappointed by that and instead i was fucking blown away. does a really good job at holding both the ancient and the contemporary because war is a timeless human behavior. the listing of ships—the listing of wars. teared up at the end
didn’t realize at first that this was a one-man show and i expected to be a bit disappointed by that and instead i was fucking blown away. does a really good job at holding both the ancient and the contemporary because war is a timeless human behavior. the listing of ships—the listing of wars. teared up at the end
March 2, 2024
RAGE! The emotion I felt when having to watch this with the most distracting audience ever.
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November 19, 2025This made me sob on the subway!
I love moments where a narrator becomes swept away by emotion and lets the thrust of the story (the fate, the inevitability) take over. I thought of the chapter in Moby Dick where Ahab enters and wrenches the story to his inexorable will, until we are reminded that Ishmael, too, was there.
I love moments where a narrator becomes swept away by emotion and lets the thrust of the story (the fate, the inevitability) take over. I thought of the chapter in Moby Dick where Ahab enters and wrenches the story to his inexorable will, until we are reminded that Ishmael, too, was there.
August 23, 2019
I've just seen An Iliad performed by NZ actor Michael Hurst and was absolutely blown away by it. It was far and away the most stunning and mesmerising piece of solo theatre I've ever seen. And marvelously written. I have only just downloaded the play on my Kindle, and plan to read it while the memory of that masterful performance is still fresh in my mind.
May 29, 2017
One of the most challenging pieces I've ever read. Beautifully put together and engaging in a way that "classic literature" has never been for me. Would love to see it staged, would love to stage it.
February 20, 2022
Isn’t it funny how hard it is to describe a good man? He’s a brave man, but deep down, he’d rather be taming horses.
screaming crying etc
screaming crying etc
April 8, 2021
HECTOR
You think you know my fate? Why should I fear Death? No, Death is on my side. He is my brother. And together we will devastate you, and murder all the Greeks!
POET
With that, he planted a heel against Patroclus’ chest, wrenched his brazen spear from the wound, kicked him over, flat on his back—
And then he tears the rest of Achilles’ armor off the dead body, savagely, awkwardly, crying out like an animal.
Hector is. . . A good guy, an honorable man. But at that moment—well. . .
(With some shame about his own infection) Yes. That’s how it happens. We think of ourselves: not me, I’m not like that, I’m a peaceful—
But it happens anyway, some trick in our blood and—
(A fierce whisper) Rage.
Do you see?
You think you know my fate? Why should I fear Death? No, Death is on my side. He is my brother. And together we will devastate you, and murder all the Greeks!
POET
With that, he planted a heel against Patroclus’ chest, wrenched his brazen spear from the wound, kicked him over, flat on his back—
And then he tears the rest of Achilles’ armor off the dead body, savagely, awkwardly, crying out like an animal.
Hector is. . . A good guy, an honorable man. But at that moment—well. . .
(With some shame about his own infection) Yes. That’s how it happens. We think of ourselves: not me, I’m not like that, I’m a peaceful—
But it happens anyway, some trick in our blood and—
(A fierce whisper) Rage.
Do you see?
December 29, 2024
Poetry and war. Poets and wars. It’s not that war is art (although I know there’s a strong argument against this) or art is war, but that they are inextricably bound to each other. Because what is the point of war if its stories don’t live on and we need poets to do that work of living on to teach, recall, retell, condemn.
Within the vast landscape of The Iliad, this play boils it down to a few warriors and gives us a narrator called The Poet to distill them into archetypes: pride, rage, force, aspiration. It ends with four pages of wars since the Greeks and Trojans, a solemnity that forces us to wonder what it is about humans that require war as part of our stories.
Within the vast landscape of The Iliad, this play boils it down to a few warriors and gives us a narrator called The Poet to distill them into archetypes: pride, rage, force, aspiration. It ends with four pages of wars since the Greeks and Trojans, a solemnity that forces us to wonder what it is about humans that require war as part of our stories.
January 5, 2024
At first I was a little put off by the one-man show being told by a “drunk” poet, but his slowly diminishing inhibitions in describing the grief and suffering caused by the Trojan War, and then his refusal to go any further after Hector’s funeral because he was so overwhelmed by it all was spectacular. Several times the poet loses control over his emotions and each time is heartbreaking and surprisingly invigorating (?) to read. I wish the pair had also written “An Odyssey”—just thinking about Odysseus in the position of the narrator drowning in grief makes me unreasonably enthusaistic!
October 24, 2024
Now the man called Hector.
(Struggling.) Shining Hector. Man-killing Hector. Hektoros hippodamoio. (He translates.) Hector breaker of horses—it’s always so hard to describe Hector—
His little brother calls him a “sharp ax”—a sharp edge, always cleaving forward...
Hector believes in—he believes in institutions, he believes in—in country, he believes in family, he believes in the army. Isn’t it funny how hard it is to describe a good man?
He’s a brave man, but deep down, he’d rather be taming horses.
(Struggling.) Shining Hector. Man-killing Hector. Hektoros hippodamoio. (He translates.) Hector breaker of horses—it’s always so hard to describe Hector—
His little brother calls him a “sharp ax”—a sharp edge, always cleaving forward...
Hector believes in—he believes in institutions, he believes in—in country, he believes in family, he believes in the army. Isn’t it funny how hard it is to describe a good man?
He’s a brave man, but deep down, he’d rather be taming horses.
March 11, 2020
I had to slow down by the end of the play, over the last pages. I had to really slow down because it was hurting and I needed to break down the pace even more. But it is so beautiful. It is the Iliad, after all. All the pain and the beauty of men’s experience is there. An embryo of the times to come. In pain and beauty.
How I wish I had the chance to watch this beautiful piece on the stage. I certainly would cry.
How I wish I had the chance to watch this beautiful piece on the stage. I certainly would cry.
July 3, 2022
Drawing on the Fagles translation of Homer's epic The Iliad, An Iliad is a monologue that explores the damage that results from succumbing to hubris. The story is as relevant now, as we experience, endure, and respond to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, as it was when the Achaeans fought Troy to regain Helen. And all the rest.An Iliad
May 5, 2020
An amazing play based on the classic epic poem. Designed to be performed by one actor. The poem is trimmed, focused, linked to contemporary and universal themes. Hope I will have a chance to see this staged. It would require an ambitious, magnetic actor. I was totally entranced and awed by this script.
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September 18, 20213.6
i think the pacifism can be a little over the top but the other aspect the writers mention they were going for - the humanism - that shines well, and there’re lots of moving passages -> one must mention that a not insignificant portion of these are directly from the fagles iliad…homer you will always be famous.
i think the pacifism can be a little over the top but the other aspect the writers mention they were going for - the humanism - that shines well, and there’re lots of moving passages -> one must mention that a not insignificant portion of these are directly from the fagles iliad…homer you will always be famous.
September 14, 2022
After experiencing a production of this play at American Players Theater in Spring Green, Wisconsin, I realized that it was the best, most gripping and poignant play I’ve ever scene. A professor gives a gut wrenching lecture about the Trojan War and the utter waste of war. Our book club read it aloud after reading Achilles by Madeline Miller, and war is more head scratching now than before.
June 16, 2023
felt like it rambled a bit but it had its moments; would likely be much more hard hitting on stage (that one's on me) though i still feel like certain sections (the lists tying into modernity) go on for too long. effective in its message.
December 19, 2023
Saw a version of the play back in 2018. I was so amazing and I've picked up the play and read bits and pieces, but finally read it all the way through.
It is such a beautiful, heart wrenching, eye-opening commentary on war, love, and story-telling. I would love to perform this play one day.
It is such a beautiful, heart wrenching, eye-opening commentary on war, love, and story-telling. I would love to perform this play one day.
October 7, 2024
"Now the man called Hector.
[….]
Hector believes in - he believes in institutions, he believes in country, he believes in family, he believes in the army. Isn’t it funny how hard it is to describe a good man?
He’s a brave man, but deep down, he’d rather be taming horses."
3.5/5
[….]
Hector believes in - he believes in institutions, he believes in country, he believes in family, he believes in the army. Isn’t it funny how hard it is to describe a good man?
He’s a brave man, but deep down, he’d rather be taming horses."
3.5/5
January 27, 2020
4.0 I am not a fan if the Iliad or the Odyssey. I am not one for Greek gods or wars but had this started that section of literature for me in high school, I might have come around. The staging plays a crucial role as well as the one person narrating the tragedies.
October 27, 2021
"every time I sing this song I hope it's the last time"
April 7, 2022
yea man this was excellent. one of the best receptions of the iliad i've seen, especially good when you see it performed. cried many times.
August 12, 2023
A good, modern adaptation that is very American and a little too topical. I would gladly watch this being performed.
March 2, 2024
Homer doesn't need this (or any?) remix.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 42 reviews