“Bois du vin …”. English, French and German translations in Persian polyglot editions of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

“Bois du vin …”. English, French and German translations in Persian polyglot editions of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. Jos Coumans.
In: Persica, 2017-2018, Vol. 26, p. 103-163.

Summary

Many recent editions of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, published in Iran, have more than one translation, sometimes up to thirty or more. Usually they contain the English translation by Edward FitzGerald, accompanied by a text in Persian and translations in French, German, Spanish, Russian, Urdu and so on. However, it is seldom clear who these translators are, as their names are usually not mentioned. In this article I have tried to identify these quatrains: who was the translator and from which edition were the quatrains selected. Nineteen editions, published in Iran between 1955 and 2016 were examined. The analyses are restricted to translations in English, French and German.