Nearer to the Heart’s Desire
This week marks the end of the Rubaiyat as the narrator asks us to toast his memory should we ever be present at his grave.
A Chequer-board of Nights and Days
This week’s quatrains emphasise our powerlessness in the hands of Fate.
The Daughter of the Vine
This week we reach the mid-point of the Rubaiyat, which emphasises the pointlessness of arguing and ruminating over unknowable facts and urges us to enjoy our lives, especially if that enjoyment includes “the Daughter of the Vine.”
The Loveliest and the Best
This week is the second examining the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam which takes a reflective turn before decrying the time wasted in pointless argument about the whys and wherefores of the world.
The Hunter of the East
For this week and the next four weeks I am looking at the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam as translated by Edward Fitzgerald in his first edition of the translation.