More commentary from What’s His Name
We begin to prepare for yet another major poetry project at NunnaYerBizness Today, re-visiting The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam and bringing the language up to date (or past the present day–who knows?–a printout of NunnaYerBizness Today could very well be the sole surviving fragment in the next medieval revival of European/Mediterranean/Mesopotamian civilization and you, your inspired verse, the first piece deciphered, could be the foundation for the next round of madness and your name elevated to saintliness*).
In occurs to us that many folks in our audience might not have considered the Rubiayat (as is our own case) for quite some time, some review may be necessary. So over the next few days, we will review, presenting major sections of the Rubiayat to rebuild familiarity, and some commentary to get juices flowing.
For a beginning, here are the first quatrains, which constitute something of an introduction and an invocation.
Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
as translated by Edward FitzGerald
I
Awake! for Morning in the Bowl of Night
Has flung the Stone that puts the Starts to Flight:
And Lo! the Hunter of the East has caught
The Sultán’s Turret in the Noose of Light.
II
Dreaming when Dawn’s Left Hand was in the Sky
I heard a Voice within the Tavern cry,
“Awake, my Little ones, and fill the Cup
Before Life’s Liquor in its Cup be dry.
III
And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before
The Tavern shouted—“Open then the Door!
You know how little while we have to stay,
And, once departed, may return no more.”
IV
Now the New Year reviving old Desires,
The thoughtful Soul to Solitude retires,
Where the ‘White Hand of Moses” on the Bough
Puts out, and Jesus from the Ground suspires.
V
Irám indeed is gone with all its Rose,
And Jamshyd’s Sev’n-ring’d Cup where no one knows;
But still the Vine her ancient Ruby yields,
And still a Garden by the Water blows.
VI
And David’s Lips are lock’t; but in divine
High piping Péhlevi, with “Wine! Wine! Wine!
Red Wine!”—the Nightingale cries to the Rose
That yellow Cheek of hers to incarnadine.
VII
Come, fill the Cup, and in the Fire of Spring
The Winter Garment of Repentance fling:
The Bird of Time has but a little way
To fly—and Lo! the Bird is on the Wing.
VIII
And look—a thousand Blossoms with the Day
Woke—and a thousand scatter’d into Clay:
And this first Summer Month that brings the Rose
Shall take Jamshýd and Kaikobád away.
IX
But come with old Khayyám, and leave the Lot
Of Kaikobád and Kaikhosrú forgot:
Let Rustrum lay about him as he will,
Or Hátim Tai cry Supper—heed them not.
Notes
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* See A Canticle for Liebowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr.
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Look here for a collection of FitzGerald’s notes on his translations.
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For an alternative translation which has much to recommend it, look here.
5 responses so far ↓
1 Jack // Jun 4, 2008 at 6:44 am
Could Darwin, with his evidence
Have gotten Omar off the fence
And shown him how we came to be?
Would Charles to Omar make good sense?
I think with Charles he would agree
For Omar sought consistency
He couldn’t take self contradiction
And religion had so much, you see.
2 Jack // Jun 4, 2008 at 8:51 am
Although it brought him no elation,
He couldn’t fault predestination.
All things move as laws command;
There is no basis for damnation.
The gods can’t hold in high regard
And offer heavenly reward
For things one couldn’t help but do
False judgement would be untoward.
3 Jack // Jun 4, 2008 at 9:25 am
To discover truth, he devoted his time
And penned his thoughts to rhythm and rhyme
But still the mysteries did persist
So he soothed his angst with red red wine.
4 Jack // Jun 4, 2008 at 10:34 am
He possessed a sharp and clear-eyed wit
Some didn’t know what to make of it
The truth is there to see, he said.
When you’re dead you’re dead, get used to it.
5 Jack // Jun 4, 2008 at 2:53 pm
I was skimming through a book entitled “The World’s Great Speeches” and ran across one delivered on December 8, 1897 by the US Ambassador to Great Britain, John Hay, before the Omar Khayamm Club of London. Here is an excerpt from the speech. I hope you enjoy it:
The exquisite beauty, the faultless form, the singular grace of those amazing stanzas, were not more wonderful than the depth and breadth of their profound philosophy, their knowledge of life, their dauntless courage, their serene facing of the ultimate problems of life and death.
Of course the doubt did not spare me, which has assailed many as ignorant as I was of the literature of the East, whether it was the poet or the translator to whom was due this splendid result. Was it, in fact, a reproduction of a new song, or a mystification of a great modern, careless of fame and scornful of his time? Could it be possible that in the eleventh century, so far away as Khorassan, so accomplished a man of letters lived, with such distinction, such breadth and insight, such calm disillusion, such cheerful and jocund despair? Was this Weltschmerz, which we thought a malady of our day, endemic in Persia in 1100? My doubt lasted only until I came upon a literal translation of the Rubaiyat, and I saw that not the least remarkable quality of Fitzgerald’s was its fidelity to the original. In short, Omar was Fitzgerald before the latter, or Fitzgerald was a reincarnation of Omar. It is not to the disadvantage of the later poet that he followed so closely in the footsteps of the earlier. A man of extraordinary genius had appeared in the world; had sung a song of incomparable beauty and power in an environment no longer worthy of him, in a language of narrow range; for many generations the song was virtually lost; then by a miracle of creation, a poet, a twin brother in the spirit to the first, was born, who took up the forgotton poem and sung it anew with all its original melody and force, and all the accumulated refinement of ages of art.
Certainly our poet cannot be numbered among the great popular writers of all time. He has told no story; he has never unpacked his heart in public; he has never thrown the reins on the neck of the winged horse, and let his imagination carry him where it listed. “Ah! the crowd must have emphatic warrant.” Its suffrages are not for the cool, collected observer, whose eye no glitter can ever dazzle, no mist diffuse. The many cannot but resent that lofty intelligence, that pale and subtle smile. But we will hold a place forever among that limited number who, like Lucretius and Epicurus — without rage or defiance, even without unbecoming mirth — look deep into the tangled mysteries of things, refuse credence to the absurd, and allegiance to the arrogant authority, sufficiently consci0us of fallibility to be tolerant of all opinions; with a faith too wide for doctrine and a benevolence untrammeled by creed, too wise to be wholly poets, yet too surely poets to be implacably wise.
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