Contents

 The Poet’s Background

 The Poet and The Poetry

 Some Quatrains (Rubaiyat) by Khayyam

The Poet’s Background

Omar Khayyám ; born Ghiyāth ad-Dīn Abu'l-Fatḥ ʿUmar ibn Ibrāhīm al-Khayyām
Nīshāpūrī (Persian: ‫ابورﻯ‬.. ‫ام نیش‬.. ‫راهیم خی‬.. ‫ر اب‬.. ‫والفتح عم‬.. ‫دین اب‬.. ‫غیاث‌ال‬, 18 May 1048 – 4 December
1131), was a Persian mathematician, astronomer, philosopher, and poet, who is widely
considered to be one of the most influential scientists of the middle ages. He wrote
numerous treatises on mechanics, geography, mineralogy and astronomy.

Born in Nishapur, in northeastern Iran, also known as Persia, at a young age he moved to
Samarkand and obtained his education there. Afterwards he moved to Bukhara and became
established as one of the major mathematicians and astronomers of the Islamic Golden Age.
He is the author of one of the most important treatises on algebra written before modern
times, the Treatise on Demonstration of Problems of Algebra (1070), which includes a
geometric method for solving cubic equations by intersecting a hyperbola with a circle. He
contributed to a calendar reform.

His significance as a philosopher and teacher, and his few remaining philosophical works,
have not received the same attention as his scientific and poetic writings. Al-Zamakhshari
referred to him as “the philosopher of the world”. He taught the philosophy of Avicenna for
decades in Nishapur, where Khayyám was born and buried. His mausoleum there remains
a masterpiece of Iranian architecture visited by many people every year.

Outside Iran and Persian-speaking countries, Khayyám has had an impact on literature
and societies through the translation of his works and popularization by other scholars.
The greatest such impact was in English-speaking countries; the English scholar Thomas
Hyde (1636–1703) was the first non-Persian to study him. The most influential of all was
Edward FitzGerald (1809–83), who made Khayyám the most famous poet of the East in the
West through his celebrated translation and adaptations of Khayyám's rather small number
of quatrains (Persian: ‫ رباعیات‬rubāʿiyāt) in the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.

The Mausoleum of Omar Khayyám

Omar Khayyám died in 1131 and is buried in the Khayyám Garden in Nishapur. The
reconstruction of the tombs of Persian icons like Hafez, Saadi, Attar, Pour Sina and others
were built by Reza Shah and in 1963, the Mausoleum of Omar Khayyám was reconstructed
on the site by Hooshang Seyhoun.
The Poet and The Poetry

Omar Khayyám was a notable poet during the reign of the Seljuk ruler Malik-Shah I and
his contributions to the developments of mathematics, astronomy and philosophy inspired
later generations.

Scholars believe he wrote about a thousand four-line verses or rubaiyat. He was introduced
to the English-speaking world through the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, which are poetic,
rather than literal, translations by Edward FitzGerald (1809–1883). Other English
translations of parts of the rubáiyát ( rubáiyát meaning "quatrains") exist, but FitzGerald's
are the most well known.

A well decorated plaque containing poems from the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám.

Ironically, FitzGerald's translations reintroduced Khayyám to Iranians "who had long

ignored the Neishapouri poet". A 1934 book by one of Iran's most prominent writers, Sadeq
Hedayat, Songs of Khayyám (Taranehha-ye Khayyám), is said to have "shaped the way a
generation of Iranians viewed" the poet.

Popularity of Khayyam’s Work across Multi-lingual Audiences

Omar Khayyám's poems have been translated into many languages. Many translations were
made directly from Persian, more literal than the translation by Edward Fitzgerald. These
almost served as the firsthand outlet into the world of khayyam’s poetry for literature and
even philosophy enthusiasts and readers in the world. The translated works provided a
global platform to the otherwise inaccessible literarture.

Here it must be noted that it was khayyam’s own prowess of expressing his ideas that
attracted a lot of sincere interest from potebtial translators among the western audiences.

The following samples are from FitzGerald's translation:

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,

Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit, 
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it. 

But helpless pieces in the game He plays,

Upon this chequer-board of Nights and Days, 
He hither and thither moves, and checks… and slays,
Then one by one, back in the Closet lays. 

And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before

The Tavern shouted— “Open then the Door! 
You know how little time we have to stay,
And once departed, may return no more.” 

A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,

A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread—and Thou, 
Beside me singing in the Wilderness,
And oh, Wilderness is Paradise enow. 

Myself when young did eagerly frequent

Doctor and Saint, and heard great Argument 
About it and about: but evermore
Came out of the same Door as in I went. 

With them the Seed of Wisdom did I sow,

And with my own hand labour’d it to grow: 
And this was all the Harvest that I reap’d—
“I came like Water, and like Wind I go.” 

Into this Universe, and why not knowing,

Nor whence, like Water willy-nilly flowing: 
And out of it, as Wind along the Waste,
I know not whither, willy-nilly blowing. 

And that inverted Bowl we call The Sky,

Whereunder crawling coop’t we live and die, 
Lift not thy hands to It for help—for It
Rolls impotently on as Thou or I. 

I sent my Soul through the Invisible,

Some letter of that After-life to spell: 
And by and by my Soul return'd to me,
And answer'd "I Myself am Heav'n and Hell:" 
Some Quatrains (Rubaiyat) by Khayyam
In childhood we strove to go to school,
Our turn to teach, joyous as a rule
The end of the story is sad and cruel
From dust we came, and gone with winds cool.

Heaven is incomplete without a heavenly

romance
Let a glass of wine be my present circumstance
Take what is here now, let go of a promised
chance
A drumbeat is best heard from a distance.

This Old World we've named Cosmos by

mistake
Is the graveyard of nights & days, no more
awake
And a feast that hundred Jamshid's did break
And a throne that hundred Bahram's did make.

This clay pot like a lover once in heat

A lock of hair his senses did defeat
The handle that has made the bottleneck its
own seat
Was once the embrace of a lover that entreat.

The palace where Jamshid held his cup

The doe and the fox now rest and sup
Bahram who hunted game non-stop
Was hunted by death when his time was up.

Tonight I shall embrace a gallon cup

With at least two cups of wine I'll sup
I'll divorce my mind and religion stop
With daughter of vine, all night I'll stay up.

Alas the youthful fire is a dying ember

The spring of life has reached December
What is termed youth, I vaguely remember
But know not whence and how from life's
chamber.