5 things visitors need to know about this weblog:

  • In the top horizontal menu next to 'About this Site' you see 'Journal'.  The Journal is the actual body of the site and contains all the posts or entries in sequence.  When the site, exploringkhayyâm, is opened, it opens in the Journal at the introductory or 'home'  page, and 'Quatrain 1' follows as the first entry or post.  Viewers are able to scroll through all four pages of journal entries if they wish.
  • Any time you select 'Journal' you will taken back to this 'home' or introductory page of the Journal. 
  • Visitors also have the option of browsing the journal entries through 'First Line Links...' and then selecting the first line of the quatrain, stanza or ghazal they wish to view. This will take them to the journal entry and the complete poem.
  • The right vertical sidebar displays other categories and contains material pertinent to each; e.g., Other Poems, Concordances, Bibliography, are a few of them.
  • Although most of the work on this site is devoted to Khayyâm, visitors will enjoy several ghazals of Hafez as well as one or two Latin and Greek poems.   

This site was developed by a non-specialist in Persian, who invites vistors to contribute by adding their own comments, by responding to questions we raise, by addressing our perplexities and by suggesting alternative readings for both the text and translations of the quatrains, ghazals and other poems found here. The selected quatrains of Khayyâm are taken primarily from the texts of Dashti, Hedayat, Forughi-Ghani (with concurrence as a reason for selection). Concordances of texts are furnished under sidebar 'Concordances.'  Please note that the more familiar spelling  "Khayyam" will be used throughout.  

For the ghazals of Hafez, I wish to express gratitude to Dr. Hossein Same'i who has steered me away from writing what is not in Hafez and who has shed light on passages that were obscure to me.  Dr. Same'i is not responsible for my renderings of Hafez into English, but he has been a helpful and necessary collaborator in 'talking these poems into English.'

 & About Me

I was first drawn to the study of Persian by Rumi and wished to read his poems in Persian and not in English.  I attribute much of this desire to a classical education where I was encouraged early in my studies to set English translations aside in spite of the many mistakes I would make in learning to read Latin and Greek.

The idea of a site on Khayyâm occurred to me when I began reading the quatrains attributed to him.  I was in my second year of Persian studies. I liked the quatrains and thought that I could read them at this stage.  From the readings I prepared translations. This weblog records my rendtions of some of the quatrains, the translations of others and discussion of each quatrain.  This is a work in progress, and in this format it has the advantage of revision.  Comments are generally philological.  In time, a better understanding of Khayyâm may allow me to return to each quatrain and add further notes.  I hope that my notes are helpful to students studying Persian.  There is a lack of commentary in English on individual quatrains, and the comments I and others make can begin to fill the void.  I encourage those who look at the site to add their comments for my benefit and for the benefit of all site visitors.

I pass over talking about the dangers of translation.  Even though it cannot hope to capture the original, the translation process helps in the understanding of the poem.  In the quatrains I have given literal translations in my discussion of each poem.  My accompanying translations of a particular quatrain, when offered, should be called renditions.  In my opinion, some are good ... and as a whole reflect the sentiment expressed in the epigram of Martial on the front page of this weblog.