"The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam"

The verses of “The Rubaiyat” are composed in iambic pentameter: Every line of verse consists of five metrical feet, each of which contains an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed sound. Differently put, every other word in an iambic line is stressed, and this alternating da-dum effect happens five times in the pentameter. Consider the first line of Verse 11, among the most quoted of Fitzgerald’s rubais: “Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough” (Line 41). The sounds of “With,” “Loaf,” “Bread,” “be-neath,” and “bough” are more prominent (stressed), creating an inherent beat in the line. Iambic pentameter is a rhythm of speech quite natural to the English language, hence its popular use in poetry and drama. When it comes to Persian, the highly poetic language naturally lends itself to end rhymes; thus, the rhyme scheme in Persian poetry (and Turkish and Urdu poetry as well) is often AAAA or AABA. The Bodleian manuscript of rubais attributed to Khayyam contains verses with both rhyme schemes; however, English not being as easy to rhyme as Persian or Urdu, Fitzgerald consistently sticks to the AABA form in his translation. The effect of combining the rubai and the iambic pentameter is somewhat magical and give Fitzgerald’s translated verses great aural appeal.