The Rubaiyat: Omar Khayyam revisited

Millions of words have been written about Omar Khayyam, the great Persian poet. So, what is new? Nothing, except that I came across an interesting review of the book Omar Khayyam: Poet, Rebel, Astronomer by Hazhir Teimourian (Sutton, £20, pp.384). The review by Justin Marozzi was originally published in the Spectator and reproduced in the Deccan Chronicle.

Marozzi starts with a statement that what most people know about Omar Khayyam could be summed up in two words – the Rubaiyat. This is true in my case. My love affair with the Rubaiyat started in the early 1950s during college days in Bangalore. Someone presented me a clothbound book containing the famous translation of the Rubaiyat by Edward Fitzgerald and a Kasida (qasida).

Rubaiyat means a pentameter quatrain. Kasida is a poetic form which has pre-Islamic origin. It has been nurtured over the centuries and is still popular. Many have been translated beautifully into English.

Kasida also means a kind of Arab needlework imported into India in the 9thc AD and practiced by the women of Bengal and Bihar. I think there is a breed of Arab horses too with that name.

I loved the collection that was presented to me and read it many times over. But I never bothered to find out more about Omar Khayyam. Now, from the book review I understand that Khayyam, born at Nishapur in the north-eastern Iran in 1032, learned music, cosmology, astronomy, and logic, among other things. He created a calendar which was more accurate than Gregorian calendar.

Justin Marozzi also says that Fitzgerald’s translations of the Rubaiyat have enriched the English language with more phrases than the Bible and Shakespeare together. The review has kindled my interest in the poet and his life. I must get hold of the book by Hazhir Teimourian.

One quote from the Rubaiyat given in the review is:

Today I will shed my robe of restraint;

Let trails of red wine my white beard taint.

No more piety; I am seventy

If not dance now, when might it then be?

Well, I am seventy-four. But it is difficult to follow Khayyam’s advice about wine. Though India exports sparkling white to France and produces fairly good wines for foreign and home markets (top makes: Grover Wineyard in association with Michel Rolland of Bordeaux, Indage, Sula), for some reason the Chennai shops do not seem to stock them.

Returning to the Rubaiyat, one of my favorite stanzas is:

Oh, Thou, who didst with Pitfall and with Gin

Beset the road I was to wander in,

Thou wilt not with Predestination round

Enmesh me, and impute my Fall to Sin?

TAMAM SHUD (It is completed.)

Also see: Book review: A Thousand Splendid Suns

Onward, Kerala

Did you know that a group consisting of academics, corporate executives, successful entrepreneurs and other committed individuals is working for Kerala’s great leap forward? It is called Kerala Global Support Network (KGSN). These powerful people who are either of Kerala origin or are friends of Kerala are on an endeavor to bring about the State’s development. I heard about it from K.O. Isaac who is the CMD of ABL Biotechnologies Ltd.

Isaac also gave me a copy of a book, Kerala’s Economy: Crouching Tiger, Sacred Cows, which he had picked up at a meeting of KGSN in Trivandrum, Kerala’s capital, in April 2007. This volume contains papers presented on Kerala in the Global Economy: Opportunities and Challenges, at a conference at Trivandrum, in December 2005. It was organized by KGSN, Stanford Center for International Development (SCID), the Asian School of Business (ASB) Trivandrum, and TiE, (a chapter of the Indus Entrepreneur, a global organization of South Asian entrepreneurs). The theme was to look at Kerala’s development strategies in the national and international context

The book is an impressive collection of articles by eminent persons. It is edited by Sunil Mani, Planning Commission Chair Professor in Development Economics, Centre for Development Studies, Thirupanamthapuram, Kerala, India, Anjini Kochar, India Programme Director, Stanford Centre for International Development (SCID), Stanford Uiversity, California, USA, and Arun M. Kumar, Partner, KPMG LLP, Silicon Valley, USA. This is a valuable volume that should be read by all those who are interested in Kerala’s progress.

In the introduction, Arun M. Kumar strikes the right note by stating that the outlook for Kerala is positive and progressive. There are ten other well-studied presentations on economic reforms, service-led growth of Kerala, enabling environment, augmenting transport infrastructure, info-communications, electricity sector, elementary schooling, higher education, and case studies of successful entrepreneurship. The last article on the outlook for Kerala in the global economy concludes with the dogma that pragmatic action should replace ideological rhetoric.

The cover, which depicts ‘Global Migration’ by K.S. Radhakrishnan, is designed by O.P. Jayakumar.

The book is published by DC Books, Kottayam, India – 686001. Online Bookstore www.dcbookstore.com

Ends.

Also see: Autobiography of a School