Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

First issued in 1859, Fitzgerald's English poem recasts Persian quatrains associated with Omar Khayyam as a continuous meditation on wine, time, and unbelief. A speaker in a garden or tavern watches the rose fade, doubts mosque and school, and prefers the cup to promises of a world to come. Later editions expand and rearrange the stanzas. Images of potter, clay, and moving finger return as the argument against piety and ambition. The work is a Victorian poetic adaptation, not a scholarly edition of the Persian text and not a biography of the astronomer-poet.

Bound in gilt pattern blocked dark red cloth based on the 1872 original binding. Printed in colour and gold ink throughout. Gilt title blocked dark red cloth slipcase.