Orientalism and Authenticity: The 1947 Random House Edition of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

This term project examines the 1947 Random House edition of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. It explains the basic features of the edition, describes the people and organizations that went into the making of this edition, discusses how it plays into or subverts the Orientalism often common with the Rubáiyát, does a close reading of the relationship between one stanza and its neighboring illustration, and finally writes a speculative letter to the owner of the book based on the archival information found in the book.

Written by Lucas Yao

Images in this Exhibit

Description of the Edition

Ornate drawing of a man and a woman sitting on the ground and holding one another

Overview

This edition is titled Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. Its author is Omar Khayyám, and it was translated into English by Edward FitzGerald. It was published in 1947 by Random House, Inc., and was simultaneously published in Canada by Random House Canada, LTD. It is 149 pages long and contains four different editions of the Rubáiyát – the first, third, fourth, and fifth. The “primary” edition is the first, and a separately titled section of the book contains the third, fourth, and fifth editions. Before the first edition, there is an additional introduction by Louis…

The Makers of This Edition

Page iv of the Rubaiyat, showing the copyright information

Page 149 of the Rubaiyat, showing the "The Artist" section

Page iii of the Rubaiyat, showing the title page

Publisher

Random House publishing has its origins in the Modern Library, a company which published cheap and accessible paperback reprints of classical literature. The Modern Library was founded in 1917 and published 109 books before being purchased in 1925 by Bennet Cerf – the vice president of the Modern Library – and Donald Klopfer. In 1927, after significantly expanding the business, Cerf and Klopfer decided that they wanted to expand the market of the Modern Library by publishing books they liked at random. Thus, they rebranded the Modern Library as Random House to suit their…

Gift Books and Orientalism

Illustration of a man holding a bottle of wine and surrounded by four women

Illustration of a man surrounded by a variety of large pots

Image of the text on page xiv, from the preface

Barbara Black argues in her book On Exhibit: Victorians and Their Museums that FitzGerald’s translation of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám and its subsequent popularity as a gift book and collector’s item are appropriations of the original text. She claims that the poem’s “talismanic value” (Black 60) comes from a combination of exoticization and colonization. On the exoticization side, FitzGerald’s translation of the Rubáiyát creates an image of a “land of seers and Eastern serenity” (Black 61) in which wine and women run aplenty. Black states that the translation…

Close Reading of One Image and Text

Image of page 88, containing stanzas 61 and 62

Image on page 89 of an old man sitting on the floor looking at a cup he holds in his hand

The illustration on page 89 depicts the act of contemplating the questions that stanza 61 on page 88 poses – is wine a gift from God or a curse? Is it a trap into blasphemy? If it’s a gift, aren’t we obligated to drink it? If it’s a curse, can it truly be from God? In doing so, it prompts the reader to similarly contemplate not only the questions on the preceding page, but the poem as a whole.

There are a couple aspects of this illustration that clue the reader into the fact that the man is contemplating God’s role in the creation of wine. First is the book on the floor and the…

Archival Speculation

bookplate on inside front cover, "The Memorial Book Fund of Oregon state University / in memory of Dr. Sigurd H. Peterson from a gift to Oregon State University by Kenneth Teter"

Text of Louis Untermeyer's introduction, page xx

A fictional letter to Kenneth Teter, from Dr. Sigurd H. Peterson

Sunday, January 15, 1956

Dear Ken,

This book is both a gift to congratulate you for obtaining your post as a Vancouver City Councilman, and as a thank-you gift in my last year here at Oregon State College before I retire to the coast. I know you have become fond of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, and I wanted to give you something special to add to your collection. As Untermeyer says, and as you soon shall read, “It is gayety as well as gusto that make the Rubáiyát the perfect…

Exhibit Tags

Rubaiyat