Translating the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

Translating poetry is difficult. A literal translation cannot be idiomatic, not can it have meter. So, a literal translation becomes prose. I’ve often wondered how far Fitzgerald had to “stray” from the original while translating the Rubaiyat. It turns out that someone analyzed this in a book: “The romance of the Rubáiyát” - Arberry (1959) .

An example: if you like the Rubaiyat, you’ll recognize Fitzgerald’s - Stanza 36:

    For in the Market-place, one Dusk of Day, 
    I watch'd the Potter thumping his wet Clay: 
    And with its all obliterated Tongue 
    It murmur'd—"Gently, Brother, gently, pray!"

It turns out that Fitzgerald did a more literal translation first, as

    Lately a potter in the market-place, with his hands the soft clay
    was working, and thumping it with strong blows,
    but the clay with sudden voice addressed the potter.
   "But we are both earth: gently, gently with me, brother!"

Note the idea in the last line. Arberry presents his own more literal translation (Stanza 13 of the original):

    Yesterday I saw a potter in the bazaar:
    He was thumping much upon a piece of fresh clay
    and that clay in its (helpless) state was (seemingly) saying to him,
    "I was once just like you: be kind to me!"

Fitzgerald’s version is designed to be in the form of an English poem: idiom, meter & rhyme. But, read it again, to see if anything was lost in translation:

    For in the Market-place, one Dusk of Day, 
    I watch'd the Potter thumping his wet Clay: 
    And with its all obliterated Tongue 
    It murmur'd—"Gently, Brother, gently, pray!"

One idea fades: the equivalence of potter and clay; the idea that “Adam” was created from dust and that we end up as dust again. Arguably, that’s the most important idea (the “punch line”) of the verse. This illustrates the difficulty of translating poetry.

I can imagine Fitzgerald struggling over the problem, and finally making the trade-off the way he did. In his version, the clay is talking: therefore it is animate. Animate, like the potter. To subtle? No wonder he made 5 editions of his translation! I’ve loved Fitzgerald’s translation since I was a kid. So, no adverse judgement from me, even if I see a better version some day.

Elsewhere in the translation, a second potter metaphor is the potter as God. This time, very clear, and beautifully “punchy” (Fitzgerald - stanza 87):

    Whereat some one of the loquacious Lot—
    I think a Sufi pipkin—waxing hot—
   "All this of Pot and Potter—Tell me then,
    Who is the Potter, pray, and who the Pot?"

Can we tell, “who is the potter”? Did God make us in his image, or was it the other way around?

Finally, one for the road… , like us God as fallible. We can blame a creator for some of our flaws too. Or rather, we can be “flawed” and still god-like. (Fitzgerald - stanza 86):

    After a momentary silence spake
    Some Vessel of a more ungainly Make;
   "They sneer at me for leaning all awry:
    What! did the Hand then of the Potter shake?"