Rubaiyat
2 hrs. 18 min.
Language
Russian
Author
Omar Khayyam
Author
Omar Khayyam
Narrator
Sergey Shakurov
Narrator
Sergey Shakurov
Description
Hafiz Khayyam’s work is one of those amazing phenomena in the history of culture of the peoples of Central Asia and Iran—and perhaps of all humankind. If his writings brought enormous benefit to the development of the sciences, then his wonderful quatrains still captivate readers with their extreme concision, laconicism, simplicity of imagery, and flexible rhythm.
Researchers judge Omar Khayyam’s poetry differently. Some believe that his poetic work was simply a pastime, something he enjoyed in his free time from his main scientific pursuits. And yet Khayyam’s rubai—without knowing temporal or national boundaries—have survived centuries and dynasties and reached our days. Here is what one of the best translators of Khayyam, German Plietsetsky, writes about it:
“Poems by a poet like Omar Khayyam may not need a preface. But since the time of his writing is separated from us by eight centuries, I decide to add a few words of my own. I’d like to tell how my own understanding of the poet I was translating gradually changed. A complex poet is often simplified. Many—me included—have formed the image of a cheerful old man with an unchanged cup in his hand, casually delivering truths. I felt the mismatch between that template and Khayyam’s true poetry already while working on the first quatrains. And gradually, through the lines of verse, the figure of a completely different person began to appear. A disputant with God, a fearless mind, alien to illusions, a scholar striving in verse for an exact formula, for an aphorism. Each quatrain is an equation. The same thought is varied again and again, examined from different sides. The premises remain the same, while the conclusions sometimes are directly opposite. In these extremes there is a higher unity—the living personality of the poet, reconciling any contradictions. Throughout his long life, Khayyam constantly returned to thoughts that were important to him, revisiting them again and again; and so will we return to his work more than once—seemingly so clear and understandable, but each time opening new possibilities, a new point of view…”
Researchers judge Omar Khayyam’s poetry differently. Some believe that his poetic work was simply a pastime, something he enjoyed in his free time from his main scientific pursuits. And yet Khayyam’s rubai—without knowing temporal or national boundaries—have survived centuries and dynasties and reached our days. Here is what one of the best translators of Khayyam, German Plietsetsky, writes about it:
“Poems by a poet like Omar Khayyam may not need a preface. But since the time of his writing is separated from us by eight centuries, I decide to add a few words of my own. I’d like to tell how my own understanding of the poet I was translating gradually changed. A complex poet is often simplified. Many—me included—have formed the image of a cheerful old man with an unchanged cup in his hand, casually delivering truths. I felt the mismatch between that template and Khayyam’s true poetry already while working on the first quatrains. And gradually, through the lines of verse, the figure of a completely different person began to appear. A disputant with God, a fearless mind, alien to illusions, a scholar striving in verse for an exact formula, for an aphorism. Each quatrain is an equation. The same thought is varied again and again, examined from different sides. The premises remain the same, while the conclusions sometimes are directly opposite. In these extremes there is a higher unity—the living personality of the poet, reconciling any contradictions. Throughout his long life, Khayyam constantly returned to thoughts that were important to him, revisiting them again and again; and so will we return to his work more than once—seemingly so clear and understandable, but each time opening new possibilities, a new point of view…”
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