Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

by FitzGerald, Edward; Karlin, Daniel

• ISBN13: 9780199580507
• ISBN10: 0199580502
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2010-07-01
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

'The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor WitShall lure it back to cancel half a Line,Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.' In the 'rubaiyat' (short epigrammatic poems) of the medieval Persian poet, mathematician, and philosopher Omar Khayyam, Edward FitzGerald saw an unflinching challenge to the illusions and consolations of mankind in every age. His version of Omar is neither a translation nor an independent poem;sceptical of divine providence and insistent on the pleasure of the passing moment, its 'Orientalism' offers FitzGerald a powerful and distinctive voice, in whose accents a whole Victorian generation comes to life. Although the poem's vision is bleak, it is conveyed in some of the most beautiful andhaunting images in English poetry - and some of the sharpest-edged. The poem sold no copies at all on its appearance in 1859, yet when it was 'discovered' two years later its first readers and admirers included Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Swinburne, and Ruskin. By the end of the century it was one ofthe best-known poems in the English language. Daniel Karlin's richly annotated edition does justice to the scope and complexity of FitzGerald's lyrical meditation on 'human death and fate'.

Author Biography

Daniel Karlin is Professor of English at the University of Sheffield. His books include Proust's English and Browning's Hatreds.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Note on the Text

Note on the Pronunciation and Transcription of Persian Words

Select Bibliography

A Chronology of Edward FitzGerald

Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

Table of Corresponding Stanzas

Contemporary Responses

Tennyson, 'To E. FitzGerald'

Variants

Explanatory Notes

Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.