The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam (Folio Society Limited Edition)

KHAYYAM, Omar. The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. Translated by Edward FitzGerald. London: The Folio Society, 2009.

Folio. Quarter vellum and Persian blue cloth. Spine lettered in 22-carat gold. Cover illustrated and stamped in three shades of gilt by Niroot Puttapipat. Top edge gilt, others uncut. [viii], 219 pp., with 16 mounted colour plates and original etching by Niroot Puttapipat. Housed in navy-blue buckram solander case. First Folio Society edition. Facsimile of the first edition of FitzGerald's translation, published by Bernard Quaritch, 1859, with some minor emendations. Limited to 1,000 copies, this being number 22. Numbered and signed by the artist on the frontispiece.

The story of Edward FitzGerald's translation of the Rubáiyát is one of the classics of happenstance. Published anonymously by Bernard Quaritch in 1859, initially to almost complete indifference, it was discovered by Dante Gabriel Rossetti in a penny box outside a bookshop and passed among the Pre-Raphaelites. It quickly became one of the most celebrated works of poetry in the English language and has never been out of print. 

The original Persian quatrains of Omar Khayyám, an eleventh-century mathematician and astronomer from Nishapur, were transformed by FitzGerald into something that is simultaneously a translation, an adaptation, and an original poem: a meditation on pleasure, impermanence, and the indifference of the universe, expressed in some of the most musical verse of the Victorian period.

The Folio Society edition of 2009, published to mark the 150th anniversary of FitzGerald's translation, presents the text of the first edition within a production of considerable elegance. The illustrations and cover design by Niroot Puttapipat — whose intricate, richly coloured work draws on both Persian miniature tradition and the decorative aesthetics of the Arts and Crafts movement — are particularly well suited to a text that has always attracted artists of an ornamental sensibility. The sixteen mounted colour plates, together with a signed original etching, give the volume a visual richness entirely appropriate to its subject. 

Fine. Volume and all contents present like new. A stunning copy.

This book is currently on display in our Paddington store. If you would like more information or to arrange a viewing, please contact: rarebooks@harryhartog.com.au

Catalogue Number: HH000162

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