The Iliad vs The Works of Alexander Pope, Volume 1
Both counted from their full texts, the same way, on the same day.
1,024words between them — 4 min of it
The Iliad is longer — 188,943 words against 187,919 for The Works of Alexander Pope, Volume 1, a difference of 1,024 words or about 4 min of extra reading. The Works of Alexander Pope, Volume 1 is the harder read, at grade 11.9 against 10.4.
SOURCE·Project Gutenberg full texts·both editions counted the same way·REVIEWED JUL 2026
Side by side
| The Iliad | The Works of Alexander Pope, Volume 1 | |
|---|---|---|
| Author | Homer | Pope, Alexander |
| Words | 188,943 | 187,919 |
| Reading time at 250 wpm | 12h 36m | 12h 32m |
| Unique words | 13,144 | 15,488 |
| Sentences | 7,279 | 6,963 |
| Average sentence length | 26 words | 27 words |
| Reading grade | 10.4 | 11.9 |
| Reading ease | 66.9 | 58 |
| Long words | 6.4% | 10% |
Highlighted cells are the larger figure — except reading ease, where higher means easier.
SOURCE·Project Gutenberg full texts·both editions, same counting rule·REVIEWED JUL 2026
How this is worked out
- Both texts are counted the same way, from the same source, with Gutenberg's header and licence footer struck first.
- The gap is stated in words and then in time at 250 words a minute — the rate is printed because a duration without one cannot be checked.
- Difficulty is compared on Flesch–Kincaid grade, which reads sentence and word length only. It cannot see irony or dialect, so treat it as a measure of surface, not of effort.
gap = |188,943 − 187,919| = 1,024 words 1,024 ÷ 250 wpm = 4 min of extra reading
The second question
Which is longer, The Iliad or The Works of Alexander Pope, Volume 1?
The Iliad is longer — 188,943 words against 187,919 for The Works of Alexander Pope, Volume 1, a difference of 1,024 words or about 4 min of extra reading. The Works of Alexander Pope, Volume 1 is the harder read, at grade 11.9 against 10.4.
Colophon
Both figures computed from Project Gutenberg plain-text editions — ebook no. 6130 and no. 32190 — and from no other source. Neither book’s text is set on this site.
SOURCE·Project Gutenberg full texts·US public domain·REVIEWED JUL 2026
Word counts and reading levels are computed from a specific public-domain edition and will differ from other editions and from other counting methods — see the method page.
