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FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát: ‘a Thing must live’

FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát: ‘a Thing must live’. Matthew Reynolds.
In: Reynolds (Ed.) 2011 – The poetry of translation. Oxford, Oxford University Press.

Summary

In Pope, contrasting metaphors collaborated as guides to his translation; in Pound, an explicit metaphor of translation is, in practice, haunted by its opposite. FitzGerald associated various metaphors with his Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam: friendship with Omar, preservation of the ‘Oriental Idiom’ and: ‘at all Cost, a Thing must live.. Better a live Sparrow than a stuffed Eagle’. This last is the most inward with his practice as it is nourished by reflections in the original Persian as to how life might continue into different creatures, or even somehow persist in inanimate matter. Yet such ‘life’ is radically ambiguous: the Rubáiyát is a questioning text in which the categories that usually discipline translation dissolve—as do my own categories of metaphorical explanation.

Gilbert Lazard, translator of Omar Khayyam

Gilbert Lazard, translator of Omar Khayyam. Mohammad Ziar.
Faits de Langues 38 (2011), pp. 97-102.

Summary

Besides his Grammar of Contemporary Persian (1957) and French-Persian Dictionary (1990) Gilbert Lazard is also the translator of twelve books, including One Hundred and One Quatrains of Omar Khayyam (1994) where he tried to translate robaïat from the great Persian poet and philosopher, a translation more consistent with the taste of French readers and francophones. Obviously Gilbert Lazard has read but did not like many of the translations of Omar Khayyam’s quatrains done before him, finding them too solemn, which according to him, would not accord very well with robâï lightness and flexibility. So that’s why he decided that a new poetic translation would be better than those of Jean-Baptiste Nicolas: The quatrains of Omar Kheyyam, (1867), Charles Grolleau: The quatrains of Omar Kheyyam (1902), Claude Anet: Robais 144, (1920), Franz Toussaint (1924), Arthur Guy: The Robaï Kheyyam Omer (1935), P. Seghers: Omar Khayyam, his life and his quatrains, (1982), Mostafa Farzaneh and Jean Malapate: Cats of Omar Khayyam) (1993) … We, therefore, propose that some of these translations as well as One Hundred and one Quatrains be compared with the original text to see the strength of each and examine the quality of Gilbert Lazard’s translation.

Translating Metaphor and Simile from Persian to English: A Case Study of Khayyam‘s Quatrains

Translating Metaphor and Simile from Persian to English: A Case Study of Khayyam‘s Quatrains. Morteza Zohdi ; Ali Asghar Rostami Saeedi.
About Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 1 (2011) 9 (Sept.), pp. 1122-1138.

Summary

Metaphor and simile are two figures of speech which make comparison between two things. These two figures of speech are widely used by writers and poets in their literary works and Persian poets are no exception. Metaphor and simile often create problem for translators. These problems are even more complicated in poetry due to its compactness and its obligation to preserve the sound effects. This research intends to identify the most accurate translation made of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam in translating its metaphors and similes. Khayyam is a well-known poet in the west and certainly the most famous one. This fame is due to the translation of his Rubaiyat by the Victorian poet Edward FitzGerald. But FitzGerald has not rendered an accurate translation and has done a more or less a free translation. In his translation, many of the verses are paraphrased, and some of them cannot be confidently traced to any of Khayyam’s quatrains at all. Other translators also have translated Rubaiyat. This study investigates two translations of Rubaiyat (i.e. FitzGerald and Arberry) with regard to similes and metaphors.

The illustration of FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát and its contribution to enduring popularity

The illustration of FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát and its contribution to enduring popularity. W.H. Martin, S. Mason.
In: FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. Popularity and neglect. Ed. by A. Poole et al. London, Anthem Press, 2011. pp. 233-248.

In this paper, the authors aim to shed more light on how it is that Edward FitzGerald’s short poem became one of the most widely illustrated books of all time. They consider the social and economic framework within which publication of FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát reached its zenith and the critical role played by technical change in this important period. They examine in more detail the role of certain key actors, notably individual publishers and their illustrators, in the process of Rubáiyát publishing. And, by looking at the longer term evolution of Rubáiyát publishing through the twentieth century, they try to reach a clearer view of the importance of illustration to the enduring popularity of the poem.

The vogue of the English Rubáiyát and dedicatory poems in honour of Khayyám and FitzGerald

The vogue of the English Rubáiyát and dedicatory poems in honour of Khayyám and FitzGerald. P. Loloi.
In: FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. Popularity and neglect. Ed. by A. Poole et al. London, Anthem Press, 2011. pp. 213-231.

Since the publication of Swinburne’s ‘Laus Veneris’ in 1866, there have been thousands of poems whose existence would have been impossible without the example of FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát. For convenience of discussion (and, of course, only a small proportion of this material can be examined), these poetic materials are considered under three headings: parodies, imitations and dedicatory poems.

‘Some for the glories of the sole’: the Rubáiyát and FitzGerald’s sceptical American parodists

‘Some for the glories of the sole’: the Rubáiyát and FitzGerald’s sceptical American parodists. A.S. Drury.
In: FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. Popularity and neglect. Ed. by A. Poole et al. London, Anthem Press, 2011. pp. 193-212.

Drury sees in American parodies of the Rubáiyát a critique of the uncomplicated celebration of cultural fusion that many of FitzGerald’s champions promulgated. Her examples include the different uses of the Rubáiyát made by Mark Twain, Oliver Herford, and the ‘Hoosier poet’ James Whitcomb Riley.

Le Gallienne’s paraphrase and the limits of translation

Le Gallienne’s paraphrase and the limits of translation. A. Talib.
In: FitzGerald’s Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. Popularity and neglect. Ed. by A. Poole et al. London, Anthem Press, 2011. pp. 175-192.

Talib shows that Richard Le Gallienne’s 1897 edition of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám is an original work of literature that helps us understand the contemporary tensions surrounding academic and commercial translation and the place of the Rubáiyát in English literary history.