Rubber Yacht of Hymie Cohen (poetry)

Statue of Persian poet Omar Khayyam, University of Madrid, Spain

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam series of postcards by M. V. Dhurandhar (Wiki)

• 

  Why would a Persian poet need a yacht?

  What is a rubber yacht? - It is a plasticized dinghy.
• Who is Hymie? It is a religious slur for Jews derived from the Hebrew Chaim ("life"), pronounced /hai-ym/ or /hay-yim/. It is also used in the term "Hymietown," a nickname for Brooklyn, NY, and as a Jewish first name.
• Who is Cohen? - Common Jewish surname, reminiscent of a priest or someone descended from a priestly caste.
• In that case, what is The Rubber Yacht of Hymie Cohen? - It is a misapprehension and misunderstanding of the famous translated Persian text, Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam: new modern translation

Host Mitch Jeserich, Letters & Politics, KPFA.org, Berkeley

Professor Juan Ricardo Cole

GUEST: Prof. Juan Cole is a public intellectual, prominent blogger, and essayist, and the Richard P. Mitchell Collegiate Professor of History at the University of Michigan. He is the translator of The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam: A New Translation from the Persian.

• AUDIO: The history behind The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam

Kindle edition (Prof. Juan Cole)

Omar Khayyam (1048–1131) was a Persian astronomer and mathematician born in Nishapur in northeastern Iran, who lived and worked at the courts of the Seljuk dynasty.

Modern scholars agree that there is very little (if any) of the collected work of poetry known as the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam that can with certainty be attributed to the historical figure.

A tradition of attribution grew up in the centuries after Khayyam’s death, which culminated in the popular Edward Fitzgerald’s translation in the 19th century. More

• The 'Hymie' Incident: Jesse Jackson claimed comments were harmless (Los Angeles Times)
• Mitch Jeserich, Letters & Politics, kpfa.org, Aug. 5, 2025; Shauna Schwartz, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly