COVE

Edward Said stated in his introduction to Orientalism, “Orientalism is a style of thought based upon an ontological and epistemological distinction made between ‘the Orient’ and (most of the time) ‘the Occident’” (2). In this tradition, the East is not simply a geographic region but a constructed category through which the West defines itself as rational, modern, and superior. Barbara Black takes up this frame in her examination of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám in On Exhibit: Victorians and Their Museums; she argues that the book is an Orientalist artifact through both translation and commodification(61) . She suggests that the poem was appropriated—first by Edward FitzGerald’s free translation, which reimagined Khayyám through Victorian sensibilities, and then by the publishing industry, which turned the poem into a decorative object. “This poem’s value,” she writes, “becomes inseparable from its pretty, crafted, possessable diminutiveness. Khayyám’s verse remains entrenched in the categorically Oriental, in the land of seers and Eastern serenity” (B61).  For Black, the orientalist framework comes from the book's physicality. The Rubáiyát's transformation into a gift book reflects a Western desire to reduce Persian culture into a collectible fantasy—something small, beautiful, and controllable.

In many ways, my edition of The Rubáiyát, published by Pocket Books, reflects Black's arguments around the physicality of the book. Although it lacks the luxurious materials of earlier gift books, it preserves the decorative impulse in both cover design and interior illustration. The front cover features stylized gold lettering on a black background, framed by an ornate floral pattern evocative of Islamic art (Figure 1). Below the title, an image based on quatrain XI shows two lovers sitting beneath a tree with a book of verse and a flask of wine—an image that aligns neatly with Said’s definition of the Orient as “a place of romance, exotic beings, haunting memories and landscapes” (1).

The illustrations within the book further reinforce its exoticizing lens, drawing on the visual language of the pulp tradition—a genre deeply steeped in Orientalist tropes. One need only recall the work of pulp author Sax Rohmer, whose Fu Manchu novels popularized a sensationalized and stereotypical image of the East. The artist, Gordon Ross, depicts scenes of lush gardens, turbaned figures, and flowing robes—all designed to evoke an imagined Persian past. This is especially clear in the illustration in the accompaniment of quatrain VIII. The illustration depicts a tree in bloom; pedals or leaves fall from its branches. Beneath the tree, a young woman with black hair is nude, the petals/ leaves fall around her, her breasts are exposed and a faint outline hints at her nipples (Figure 2). This image works on two registrars, first it creates the fantasy of the orient as a place fertile, and lush with vegetation always in bloom. That is to say, it is a land vast in resources. However, it is also a place of depravity. It is a place where lascivious women may be found under every tree. The depiction titillates as it repulses. As such, it encourages the reader not to understand Persian culture, but to escape into a fantasy of it. This is precisely what Black identifies when she says the Rubáiyát became “thoroughly objectified” (61)—less a work of literature and more a portal to the Western dream of the Orient.

However, in many ways, my edition of the Rubáiyát undermines Black’s argument by complicating the relationship between Orientalist content and material form. While the illustrations and language reinforce a fantasy of the East—a landscape of sensuality, mysticism, and abundance—the book’s physical construction refuses the elevation implied by earlier luxury editions. No one could describe this volume as “a jewel,” “a Persian pearl,” or “a ruby in a ring of gold” (61). While the paper isn't pulp itself (this edition being published before the U.S. entrance into World War II), it does have a glued binding, and red-dyed edges. This suggests it intent was as a mass-market object, designed to be sold for twenty-five cents and consumed by a broad, working-class readership. Indeed, the final pages of the book are an advertisement for other novels sold by Pocket Books (Figure 3). The final pages don’t elevate this edition, but situate it as a commodity alongside other commodities. While it certainly reduces the status of this seminal piece of Persian poetry, it doesn’t simultaneously elevate western literature—it flattens them to the same status. This tension between content and form suggests that, by the time of this edition’s publication in 1939, the Rubáiyát had shifted from being a bourgeois collectible to a product of popular culture. Its Orientalist imagery remained intact, but the economic context had changed. Rather than serving as a token of elite aesthetic taste, the Rubáiyát here functions more like a paperback fantasy novel—cheap, portable, and ephemeral. The commodification Black critiques is still present, but democratized: not an object to be displayed in a parlor cabinet, but something to be flipped through on a bus ride or gifted casually between acquaintances.

This does not absolve the edition of its complicity in Orientalist representation. It still presents Persian culture through a lens of Western fantasy and eroticization. But it does suggest that Orientalism, by the early 20th century, had become deeply embedded in popular forms—available to the masses, not just the elite. In this sense, the objectification of the Rubáiyát had gone full circle: from sacred manuscript to decadent collectible to pulp commodity. Thus, my edition both supports and complicates Black’s argument. It confirms that the Rubáiyát was appropriated and objectified—but also reveals how Orientalism adapted to new audiences and material forms. Rather than a precious artifact, this book became a disposable dream— a cheap escape.

Work Cited

Black, Barbara. On Exhibit: Victorians and Their Museums. University of Virginia Press, 2000.

FitzGerald, Edward. The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. Pocket Books, 1939.

Said, Edward W. Orientalism. Vintage Books, 1979.