Book Description
In the eleventh century, in Persia, there lived a mathematician named Ghiyathuddin Abulfath Omar bin Ibrahim al-Khayyami--or, Omar, son of Abraham, the tent-maker. Omar wrote poetry, and while his rhymes received little attention in their day, they were rediscovered and translated into beautiful English--more than seven centuries later--by a gentleman and scholar named Edward FitzGerald. It was a meeting of minds, a great collaboration of the past and the present, and FitzGerald's rendition of those passionate verses has become one of the best loved poem cycles in the English language.
With their concern for the here and now, as opposed to the hereafter, Omar Khayyam's quatrains are as romantic today as they were hundreds of years ago; they are a tribute to the power of one moment's pleasure over a lifetime of sorrow, of desire over the vicissitudes of time. Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, presented here with Edward FitzGerald's original preface, is truly a classic, and it will stand forever as one of our finest monuments to love.
Language Notes
Text: English, Persian (translation)
From the Publisher
An illustrated gift edition of the quatrains of Omar the tentmaker, which have more admirers today than ever before. Edward Fitzgerald's rendition stands as a monument to the translator's art.Full-color photographs throughout.
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam ANNOTATION
Omar Khayyam (1048-1122) was a Persian mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher who was not known as a poet in his lifetime. These verses lay in obscurity until 1859, when FitzGerald published a free adapation of this Persian poetry. As a result, The Rubaiyat became one of the best-known and most often quoted English classics.
FROM THE PUBLISHER
An illustrated gift edition of the quatrains of Omar the tentmaker, which have more admirers today than ever before. Edward Fitzgerald's rendition stands as a monument to the translator's art.
Full-color photographs throughout
FROM THE CRITICS
Booknews
Fitzgerald compulsively revised his translation of the
"Rubiyt," resulting in four published editions, all of
which are presented here with their original prefaces and notes,
along with all extant versions of FitzGerald's translation. Decker
supplies biographical and textual introductions that make use of
FitzGerald's correspondence to seek motives for his revisions, the
aim being to to unearth a full record of the poem's textual
evolution, to provide an interpretive context, and to illuminate the
complex process of revision.
Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.