Rhapsodize Audio presents:
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
A translation by George Roe
One of the earliest English versions of the Rubaiyat by an American translator is that by George Roe, which was published in New York in 1910. Roe's version contains a substantial introduction and also a prefaratory "Ode to Omar", which consists of twenty quatrains, which capture the style if not the grandeur of the master's work.
In this presentation the body of the poem has been divided, somewhat arbitrarily, into eleven sections, suggestive of the stages through which a spiritual aspirant might pass. As Roe's version ends rather abruptly with his presentation of the conversation among the pots, which is also magically described by Fitzgerald, the last six quatrains from Fitzgerald's Fifth Edition have been appended in a closing section to round off the narrative.
For the sake of completeness, and also as a tribute to a translator whose work has been unduly neglected, the translator's introduction and his Ode to Omar have also been included in this presentation.
The readers are: Denis Daly, Cate Barratt, Rhonda Federman , Bob Gonzalez, Jason Mills, Jannie Meisberger, Winston Tharp, Carol Box and Alan Weyman.
Acknowledgements
The reading of the quatrain in Persian in the translator’s introduction has been very kindly provided by Nicholas Bridgewater.
https://sites.google.com/site/njbridgewater/
The music for this presentation has been has been taken from the following recording, issued by Liber Liber, under a Creative Commons Share Alike Licence:
Shéhérazade by Nikolaj Rimskij-Korsakov, performed by Chicago Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Fritz Reiner.
http://www.liberliber.it/musica/r/rimskij_korsakov/index.htm
Contents
Section 0 - Introduction by translator
Performed by Cate Barratt
Section 1 - Ode to Omar
Performed by Rhonda Federman
Section 2 - The Awakening
Quatrains 1 - 7
Performed by Bob Gonzalez
Section 3 - Spring song!
Quatrains 8 - 19
Performed by Bob Gonzalez
Section 4 - Wisdom and Wine
Quatrains 20 - 35
Performed by Jason Mills
Section 5 - The futility of learning
Quatrains 36 - 48
Performed by Rhonda Federman
Section 6 - The hammer of fate
Quatrains 49 - 55
Performed by Jannie Meisberger
Section 7 - Drowning one's sorrows
Quatrains 56 - 68
Performed by Jason Mills
Section 8 - The implacable deity
Quatrains 69 - 84
Performed by Winston Tharp
Section 9 - The Potter
Quatrains 85 - 89
Performed by Carol Box
Section 10 - The illusion of death
Quatrains 90 - 104
Performed by Alan Weyman
Section 11 - A walk in the Garden
Quatrains 105 - 114
Performed by Winston Tharp
Section 12 - The Colloquy of the Pots
Quatrains 115 - 122
Performed by Jannie Meisberger
Section 13- Epilogue - Fitzgerald - Fifth Edition
Apotheosis - disappearance into Eternity
Quatrains 96 - 101
Performed by Carol Box
For further information about Rhapsodize Audio please visit:
http://reverberance.org/
