THE FREE
His good blade carves the casques of 'men, for the Free Lance
VOL. XVI.
SOME READINGS OP OMAR KHAYYAM.
Neithei Omar Khayyam the man, nor Omar the poet, was
ever popular in his own country, Persia. He lived at Naisha
par, in the province of Khorassan, during the latter half of our
eleventh and the first quarter of our twelfth centuries. Under
the sultanate of Malik Shah he came to Merv, and obtained
great praise and favor from the sultan for his proficiency in
science. "But (to quote Fitzgerald's account of his life and
writings) though the Sultan showered favors upon him, his
Audacity of Thought and Speech caused him to be regarded
askance in his own Time and Country." Especially was he
hated and dreaded by the Silfi, with whose mysticism and
formal recognition of Islamism the thought of the time was
permeated.
Omar Khayyam, as well as being in disfavor in his own
country; has had his writings but little transmitted abroad.
There are but few translations of the Rubhiyat, the French
version by J. B. Nicolas, the English ones by Whinfield and
Edward Fitzgerald being probably the only ones worthy of
mention. It is usually supposed that in Fitzgerald's transla
tion (the best known of the three) there is more of Fitzgerald
than Khayyam, but Persian scholars tell us nothing could be
further from the truth. The versions of Nicolas and Whin
field are said to supply a closer mechanical reflection of the
sense' of each quatrain; but no one denies that Fitzgerald's
LANCE.
thrusteth sure."
JANUARY, 1903.
No. 7.