COVE

In Barbra Black’s essay, On Exhibit: Victorians and Their Museums, she writes about how The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám is appropriated by Western Culture. When Bernard Quaritch first published 250 copies of The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám it did not sell very well. It wasn’t until it was picked up by a few scholars and spread around that it took off and became popular. After this, books started to emerge of The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám that people described as “‘a jewel,’ ‘a Persian Pearl,’ or ‘a ruby in a ring of gold,’” (Black 60). The poem also became “inseparable from its pretty, craft, possessable diminutiveness,” (Black 61). The materialism that the West was fascinated with is a great example of Orientalism, with people viewing the book as a treasure from the East more than a literary piece. A lot of the imagery within the texts also reflected this idea of a mystical East that was wild and magical, nothing like the “civilized” West.

Reading this and considering The Rubáiyát of Doc Sifers afterwards, I struggled to find the pearls and rubys that Black writes of in her essay. The most lavish feature of this book is its gilded letters on the front and the gilded logo of The Century Co. on the back. (see figure 1) The plainness of the cover, the lack of any real flair, and the picture on the cover all lead me to believe that James Whitcomb Riley did not make this book with the intent of having it owned or collected for its beauty. The Rubáiyát of Doc Sifers is a gift book, but not in the way that people were making gift books with the idea of placing all of its value on the cover or size of the book they owned. The entire story, inspired by Edward Fitzgerald's translation of The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám is about a fictional Doc Sifers and the good deeds he exalts upon the community he lives in. He also offers philosophical anecdotes that are similar to the ones found within the original. This is important because if you consider in the beginning of the book it is  “Dedicated to Dr. Franklin W. Hays, The loyal chum of my latest youth and like friend and comrade still with all grateful affection of the author,” (see figure 2) and the fact that it is about a doctor who goes around his community and does a bunch of good deeds, the picture falls into place. After doing some research, I found a listing online of an edition of The Rubáiyát of Doc Sifers (see figure 3) that was given to the Dr. Franklin W. Hays. It is inscribed inside with the words, “With perfect faith in God and man a shinin’ in his eyes.” This quote is also the last line of the whole book, which leads me to believe that this story is not just James Whitcomb Riley writing a story inspired by The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. You can also see that Dr. Franklin W. Hays also inscribed the edition himself and gave away the edition. While Hays may not have appreciated the book as much as Riley wanted him to, I don't think the reaction of the person receiving the book has a bearing on the making of it. This entire creation is a gift to Dr. Franklin W. Hays, and the only reason we know is because he was “The loyal chum of my latest youth and like friend and comrade.” Because of this I do not think that James Whitcomb Riley was creating a gift book, but saw someone in his life who he held to the same standards that he held Omar Khayyám and decided to use Fitzgerald’s translation of the quatrains to inspire his own book about Dr. Franklin W. Hays.

The content of the book inspires what Fitzgerald’s translation does, but with the Doc delivering the lines instead of the narrator of The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. Most of the lines are original and the story doesn’t seem to copyThe Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám in any way whatsoever apart from the structure of the book itself. It follows him through his days, with him visiting houses or hanging out in the bar, all of these places serve as set pieces for him to deliver his wisdom. I believe that since this book was written about the doctor and that James Whitcomb Riley seems close with him, that it actually draws most of its content from what Dr. Franklin W. Hays actually acted like and said. Because of that I do not think the inside of this book does not appropriate Persian culture either.

On that note, there is one caveat with this whole reading, and that is the fact that James Whitcomb Riley ultimately had Doc Sifers say what Khayyám’s narrator said in The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. This isn’t exactly Orientalism, but a sort of “familiarization” of Persian culture that Black writes about in her essay. So while the edition may not have the obvious flair, the conversion of the story to a narrative about an American man living in Indiana takes away from the cultural value of it as a whole, and tries to Americanize it to make it more digestible to the Western reader.

Works Cited

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