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FitzGerald’s Anglo-Persian Rubáiyát

FitzGerald’s Anglo-Persian Rubáiyát. R. Taher-Kermani.
Translation and Literature, 23 (2014), nr. 3 (324-335)

This article examines Edward FitzGerald’s translation practice and the poetics of his Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám (1859) in order to to enrich and supplement previous critiques. FitzGerald succeeded in ‘Persianising’ his re-writing of the rubáiyát by importing matter of peculiar Persian significance. In order to identify it, his translation of Khayyám needs to be read with, so to speak, a Persian eye; it has to be scrutinized as a native critic would read and analyse the poetry of, for example, Hāfiz. This is the fundamental approach of this essay.

The benefits of reading the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam as pastoral

The benefits of reading the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam as pastoral. Giuseppe Albano.
Victorian Poetry, 46 (2008), nr 1, p. 55-67.

On the publication of J. B. Nicolas’ French translations of Omar Khayyam –collected in book form as Les quatrains de Kheyam in 1867, having initially appeared in the Revue de l’Orient, de l’Algerie et des Colonies four years earlier–Edward FitzGerald was provoked into a caustic disagreement with its translator. The Frenchman held that Omar’s testaments to the benefits of drinking wine should not be taken literally, but should be seen in Sufi terms as representing an enlightened state of being.

Traduire c’est trahir: des Arabian Nights aux Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

Traduire c’est trahir: des Arabian Nights aux Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Laurent Bury.
In: L’orientalisme victorien dans les arts visuels et la littérature. Laurent Bury. Grenoble, ELLUG, 2011. ISBN: 978-2843101762

Il est une forme de colonisation plus pacifique, mais aussi moins univoque, puisqu’elle autorise une influence réciproque : l’assimilation d’une culture par une autre que suppose l’exercice de la traduction. Avec l’engouement qu’elle suscite pour les langues lointaines, la « Renaissance orientale » est à l’origine d’une floraison d’arrangements et d’adaptations, dans lesquels les Victoriens refusent de s’effacer humblement, préférant rester auteurs à part entière. Comme le montrera l’exemple de quelques traductions orientales produites au XIXe siècle, l’intervention de l’interprète y est souvent très visible.

Astronomical References In The Ruba’iyât Of Omar Khayyam

Astronomical References In The Ruba’iyât Of Omar Khayyam. Imad-Ad-Dean Ahmad.

Delivered to the Third International Conference on the Inspiration of Astronomical Phenomena, Mondell, Sicily, January, 2001.

Omar Khayyam was both an astronomer and a poet. We examine the astronomical references in different translations of his poetry and in Elihu Vedder’s illustrations of the first American edition of Edward Fitzgerald’s famous translation as the takeoff points for discussing the controversy as to the meaning of his poetry and the differences in culture between 11th-century Iran where he wrote them and 19th-century Britain and America where Fitzgerald and Vedder respectively were born.

‘Umar Khayyám au mirroir de quelques interprétations modernes, de FitzGerald à Hedáyat

‘Umar Khayyám au mirroir de quelques interprétations modernes, de FitzGerald à Hedáyat. Jacques Huré.
Luqmán 17 (2001) nr. 1, p. 7-15.

‘Umar Khayyám peut être vu, aujouid’hui, comme un «agitateur d’idées», le carrefour où se rassemblent ceux qui s’interrogent sur la portée des textes anciens d’où émane cette notion moderne qu’est l’incertitude du sens, ceux qui s’interrogent sur le rapport entre le discours spirituel et le discours philosophique, et, plus généralement ceux qui discutent de la pensee “oriëntale”, telle qu’elle doit prendre place dans tout débat ouvert aujourd’hui en Occident.

Love and wine in Khayyam and Hafez

Love and wine in Khayyam and Hafez. R. Foltz.
In: Persian studies in North America. Studies in honor of Mohammed Ali Jazayery. Ed. by M. Marashi. Bethesda, Iranbooks, 1994. p. 417-421.

Both Omar Khayyam and Hafez of Shiraz are known for writing about wine and love, yet the use of similar images by the two poets belies a great difference in content. This should not be surprising, since beyond the fact that their lives were separated by were separated by three centuries, the two men differed vastly in nature as well as circumstance.