Omar and Edward, bestest friends who lived 1000 years apart
Do you mind a little white lie?
Hold that thought.
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam are a set of just a bit over 100 4-line stanzas (called quatrains) of poetry. They were originally written in Persian and first brought to the attention of the western world when Edward Fitzgerald (not Edmund Fitzgerald–that was the ship that sank in Lake Erie) translated them.
They’re a bit…unbelievable.
Here’s a little sampling:
As under cover of departing Day
Slunk hunger-stricken Ramazan away,
Once more within the Potter's house alone
I stood, surrounded by the Shapes of Clay.
Shapes of all Sorts and Sizes, great and small,
That stood along the floor and by the wall;
And some loquacious Vessels were; and some
Listen'd perhaps, but never talk'd at all.
Said one among them—"Surely not in vain
My substance of the common Earth was ta'en
And to this Figure molded, to be broke,
Or trampled back to shapeless Earth again."
Then said a Second—"Ne'er a peevish Boy
Would break the Bowl from which he drank in joy;
And He that with his hand the Vessel made
Will surely not in after Wrath destroy."
After a momentary silence spake
Some Vessel of a more ungainly Make;
"They sneer at me for leaning all awry:
What! did the Hand then of the Potter shake?"
The talking pots here, questioning their maker, are a little like us asking about our own purpose in life. It’s beautiful writing and a fascinating idea.
The thing about this poem is…it’s not what it seems to be.
Omar was known for science and mathematics in his lifetime. We have a tiny bit of evidence that he wrote some poetry, but quite a lot of what is attributed to him was probably written by others under his name. That’s a little odd by itself, like someone writing a poem and attributing it to Albert Einstein, but it gets weirder.
Where’s the lie?
When Edward Fitzgerald made his translations, he admitted to taking some “liberties” in the translation for poetic effect. It turned out quite a lot of the Rubaiyat he popularized was his own riffing on the material in the original. The “real” Rubaiyat talks a bit about pots and vessels, but doesn’t have the dramatic confrontation with their potter. That was mostly Edward’s invention.
This leads to an important question: did our man Eddie do something…bad?
He admitted pretty openly that he took liberties. And his flights of fancy mixed in with actual translation of the underlying poetry resulted in something pretty cool on its own. So why does it make us feel just a wee bit uncomfortable?
These jars are just about to flip their lids at their potter.
How authentic are your ads?
I think this situation is a whole lot like advertising, actually. Most ads are not written by the people who actually make the product or provide the service. The ads are inspired by those folks and written by a professional ad writer like me. Is that still “authentic?” The core of the message comes from the experience and values of the owner-operator, but an expert crafts the strategy and the words. The ad is more powerful as a result, and still based on something true.
The original Rubaiyat was written by a bunch of different people, perhaps, under a real person’s name. Then a translator took many of the ideas expressed and added to them himself. All of it has to do with life, both its purpose and how much you can enjoy it. If the poem is meaningful to us, how much do we care how it was made?
There’s another part to this.
The best ads make you dream
They aren’t strictly about the benefits and features of a product or service. Nike doesn’t want you to love their athletic wear because it lasts the longest or helps you move the fastest of all the other options, even if that’s true. They want you to believe that true athletes wear Nike–that if you wear the logo, you’re a part of a club of folks who don’t give up no matter what. But that’s a dream. I bet if you ran some stats, wearing Nike makes you no more likely to win than anything else.
Tell me: if pretty much any running shoe you buy will work, wouldn’t you want to feel like you’re part of a special tribe when you put yours on?
That’s the magic of marketing.
Fitzgerald completely invented some of the most fascinating parts of the poem. It’s hard for me to be mad at him for that. Just like I struggle to be mad at Apple for strongly implying I’ll feel more like a unique, free-thinking individual if I use their products.
We want the products and services we use to mean something. Food or drink isn’t just a flavor. It’s our favorite. It reminds us of good memories. Our mechanic doesn’t just fix our car. He’s our type of guy. Our financial advisor doesn’t just run numbers for us. We’re on a team making our dreams a reality.
Does the product or service you sell work like that?
Do folks want to be part of your tribe? If not, we should talk. We can help you figure out your own powerful message to share, and then help you share it.