"Look to the Rose..."
OMAR KHAYYA'M
THEATRE COMPANY
"The theatre aspires to wake the soul by tender strokes of art,
to raise the genius and to mend the heart"
ALEXANDER POPE
PRESENTS
a
Celebration of Universal Genius
"Talk not of Genius baffled - Genius is the Master of Man
Genius does what it must - talent does what it can"
Robert Bulwer Lytton
Edward FitzGerald's 'Suffolk Psalm' One of Suffolk's greatest gifts to the world
"your Golden Eastern lay" Alfred, Lord Tennyson
A Persian Flying Magic Carpet of a poem...
"I hear those voices that will not be drowned..." George Crabbe
"Light upon light"... Genius awakens Genius... Awakens our intuition... inspires love for Unity, Truth, Harmony & Beauty just as this poem fired T.S.Eliot's imagination to become a poet like so many others & likewise fires countless artists, authors & song writers like Bob Dylan and ourselves to explore, experience & express our own Genius
"These two are not two,
Love has made them One
Amo Ergo Sum
And by Its Mystery,
Each is no less, but more."
Benjamin Britten
A popular Edwardian song inspired by The Ruba'iya't
"When you see a rose - sing like a nightingale
When you see spiritual companions - tell them of Mysteries..."
Jalal al-din Rumi
"True poems flee... Emily Dickinson
"Poetry is a sword of lightning ever unsheathed, which consumes the scabbard that would contain it"
Percy B Shelley
" If...a poem have a genius, it will force its own reception in the world; for there's sweetness in good verse, which tickles even while it hurts."
John Dryden
"His Omar is a Masterpiece of Art" OscarWilde
"This immortal poem...the finest and most famous translation ever made..."
Professor Arthur Arberry
"The first edition of the Ruba'iya't is a Masterpiece..." Professor Daniel Karlin
* * *
Wisdom opens doors...
Simple, subtle, penetrating and profound... "I hear those voices that will not be drowned" George Crabbe
- WE ARE PLEASED TO ANNOUNCE - ongoing lectures/recitals include Scotland's Stories NOW - livestreamed from The Edinburgh Book Festival Saturday 20th August 2022 at 1.00pm. Past lectures and recitals include the 'Spirit of The Rose' Sunday November 7th 2021 at 2.00pm in The Bull Inn, Woodbridge, Suffolk: Tickets www.spiritofwoodbridge.com INTERNATIONAL AGATHA CHRISTIE FESTIVAL - Torquay
BURY ST EDMUND'S LITERATURE FESTIVAL - www.burylitfest.com
and why not book your event now tailor made to your requirements, from a full theatre stage multimedia presentation with music, photographic & archive film projection to semi-staged or a simple lectern presentation
Have you seen https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-57683638 about The Great Omar ?
" There are many events in the womb of time which will be delivered" William Shakespeare
"Come, my friends, Tis not too late to seek a newer world...for my purpose holds to sail beyond the sunset"
from Ulysses by Alfred Lord Tennyson
"Great Ships ask Deep Waters" P.s Have you seen the excellent film 'Life on the Deben' including a cameo on E.F.G ? it is available from www.lifeonthedeben.com
Three amusing parodies
"Divine Light strikes the soul broad awake"
Evelyn Underhill
"With the uttering of Hu - the Reality unveils Itself...that the Traveller may Know 'The Secret'"
Uftade
"O! haste my flight from all material forms that i may drink of Perfect Beauty's streams and rise to Mystic Union with its fount for thus my nature shall be all Divine and Deity in Deity exult"
Thomas Taylor
Welcome
"These are the stars which poets, as they can
Image for us to stir us in our sleep,
That some may dream, and some perhaps awake."
Francis Engleheart
'FitzOmar' by Fougasse
"Know yourself and in that Instant
Know the Other and see therefore
Orient and Occident
Cannot be parted for evermore"
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
"Symbolism is the universal language"
Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton
Where Genius awakens Genius...
Author - actor - audience
Light... flight... delight
Explore, experience & enjoy one of the world's most enlightening, entertaining, exciting & satisfying poems ever written...
"Taste is the feminine of Genius" E.F.G
As Edward FitzGerald 1809 - 1883 of Woodbridge in Suffolk UK absorbed the genius of Plato, Virgil, Homer, the Bible, Omar Khayya'm 1048 -1131 Hafiz, Sa'di, Jami, Rumi & especially Attar's magnificent The Canticle of the Bird's, Dante, G. Herbert, William's Shakespeare & Blake (owning a rare copy of 'Songs of Innocence' printed by W. Blake himself) John's Milton, Dryden and Keats, Goethe, Shelley, Burns et al so Divine Light Awakened Itself to Itself... awakening his own poetic genius, thus shaping the unique & enigmatic masterpiece The Ruba'iya't of Omar Khayya'm
A Light trigger... this work affirms the Universality of Soul amidst The Unity of Spirit or 'Oneness' as all soul's mastered by the Spirit see it... just as BBC One share's it & this wise, funny but challenging poem - our universal story has gone on to sell millions of copies around the world ever since it was published in 1859.
WHY has it struck such a chord & continues to do so ? the simple answer is - Identity - Light attracts Light so Like attracts Like, thus Genius awakens Genius... activating the innate Universal First Principles of Harmony, Truth and Beauty within our souls, thus intuitively uniting us all on all levels of our being, across time, countries, faiths & dimensions speaking to us wherever we are at, lifting us ever higher and deeper into the greater picture of Divine Unity. A timeless Spiritual Classic as classified by T.S.Eliot likewise inspiring him to his own poetic vocation - such is self-evident to some, but not to others, hence a need to not only read it quietly, meditate on it, read books about and around it, but also to listen - hear it read / shared in a communal situation, focussing, lifting our understanding from the literal, through the allegorical & symbolic to the moral - thence to the Mystical.
Listen to its inner dynamic of thesis, antithesis and synthesis speaking to us about the Great Circle of a day, year... the lifetime of all creation & such will fire your imagination satisfying our communal thirst for the Infinite 'Paradise e'now' the Realization of Reality " I shall be satisfied when I awake in thy likeness"
Psalm 17 v15
" ALL THE MYSTIC'S COME FROM THE SAME COUNTRY AND SPEAK THE SAME LANGUAGE" William Blake
" Light upon Light" "this Light is Love"
Qur'an 24:35 Mother Julian of Norwich
"ONE EQUAL LIGHT"
John Donne
"When... the Divine Light penetrates the soul, it is united with God, as Light with Light. Anyone who enters the soul's ground, no longer cares about the past or the future. They are aware only of the present moment, which alone is shot through with the Divine Light...where time touches Eternity"
Meister Eckhart
"There is ONE Light that shines beyond all things...
This IS the Light that shines in our Heart"
Chandogya Upanishad
The front cover of a first edition of Edward FitzGerald's 2nd book 'Polonius' published in 1852 by William Pickering of London and printed by J.Childs in Suffolk
"A single Alif were the clue..!"
Omar Khayya'm & Edward FitzGerald - A Celebration of Universal Genius at Woodbridge Library on 18th September, 2018 "Excellent" Tim Cornford F.O.W.L
Edward FitzGerald
'High thinking - plain living'
Old Fitz's Motto
"INSPIRING" Jan Pulsford
A lecture and recital at Drinkstone Village Hall, Suffolk
Part of the exhibition table in the Ballroom of Torre Abbey, Torquay for the International Agatha Christie Festival 2019
"Wonderful" James Tyson
Artistic Director
"through the Dusk an An Angel Shape..."
Edward FitzGerald's Bookplate incorporating the family coat of arms as designed by his friend William Makepeace Thackeray
E.F.G's Broadwood piano currently on show at Christchurch Mansion in Ipswich, Suffolk
E.F.G's Writing & Reading desk also on show at the Mansion
"The throne of thy father Zeus and the star's thy valour won thee are thy abode. Hebe, Cup bearer of the Gods, Princess of Immortality, hands thee the draught of blissful nectar" Silvae Statius
ONLY CONNECT
"O Marvel !
A Garden amidst flames
My heart has become capable of every form:
It is a pasture for Gazelles,
A Convent for Christian Monks.
A Temple for Idols,
The Pilgrims Ka Aba,
The Tables of the Torah
and the Book of the Koran.
I follow the Religion of Love.
Whatever way Loves Camels take
That is my Religion and my Faith."
IBN ARABI
Photo credit Sheila Burnett
Charles Mugleston was born in Ipswich, Suffolk in 1954. Acting leading roles at school & with amateur operatic societies, he took to the professional stage in the early 1980's touring the UK with re-creations of Charles Dicken's Dramatic Public Readings and likes to imbue readings of The Ruba'iya't with a similarly expressive manner of presentation - poetry in motion - just as Edward FitzGerald who loved the theatre commented on his own translations: "Better a live sparrow, than a stuffed eagle...!"
Edward FitzGerald met Charles Dickens once - dining and playing cards at his home along with Alfred Tennyson and W.M.Thackeray and liked the author very much both being committed to public / selfless service - to freeing people from limiting attitudes, actions and conditions.
Charles read Dickens's brilliant 'A Christmas Carol' at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London in 1985 for The Friends, has played the part of Fagin in the musical 'Oliver!' twice - last played at Ipswich Regent in 2012 and began giving readings of The Ruba'iya't in 2009 for the Bicentenary.
He has always been interested in spiritual matters - loves reading the works of all Spiritual Traditions and the more he reads The Ruba'iya't privately and publicly the more he appreciates its value being a mirror to us all - a noetic poetic equivalent of Dickens's universally loved story'A Christmas Carol'.
Ordained in 2002 and Consecrated in 2007 - he won 'Minister of the Year' runner up at the 2017 'Good Funeral Awards' and enjoys writing poetry, magazine articles and maybe one day - hopefully - a book.
His mothers grandmother was buried in Ashbocking Churchyard, Suffolk by the Revd Canon Maurice Byles Cowell brother to the humble Professor Edward Byles Cowell first professor of Sanskrit at Cambridge University - a very good / providential friend to EFG and to us, as it was he who introduced a transcript of the 15th century manuscript The Ruba'iya't of Hakim Umar Khayya'm held in the Bodleian Library, Oxford to EFG.
For the local 1909 Suffolk Edward FitzGerald Centenary Celebrations whose Patrons included Thomas Hardy, H.G.Wells, H.Beerbohm Tree,etc Canon Maurice Byles Cowell concluded his Centenary Sermon with the following words :
"There beneath that Cross on his gravestone lies one of God's Master workmen, who had his vocation and served...according to the will of God"
"Our deepest Self-Knowledge unfolds as we are embraced by Beauty" John O'Donohue
"To live in the Light of The Universal Order is 'To Be' awake; to turn aside into our own microcosm is to go to sleep" Heraclitus
"He is known in the ecstacy of an awakening which opens the door of Life Eternal"
Kena Upanishad
www.interfaith.org.uk www.vedantauk.com
www.suffolkpoetrysociety.org.uk
www.actorsbenevolentfund.co.uk
www.suffolkchurches.co.uk/boulge.html
www.dalailama.com www.heritageinstitute.com
https://omarkhayyamrubaiyat.wordpress.com
Our thanks to all for quote & photo permissions
Preparing for a performance of "This first Summer Month" 28th June 2018 at St Ethelburga's Centre for Reconcilation and Peace,78, Bishopsgate, London. EC2N 4AG
where EFG's old Bury St Edmunds school chum The Revd John Medows Rodwell, a friend of Charles Darwin and translator of The Holy Koran celebrated Holy Communion for over fifty years.
Homage to Hakuin
How brilliant the full moon
This very moment Oneness
Anywhere Paradise
Everyone Awake
Charles Mugleston
May we commend 'The Bird of Life' Omar Khayyam video on Youtube - beautiful.
"and Lo! The bird is on the Wing" Quatrain 7
And all must love the human form
In heathen, turk or jew,
Where Mercy, Love & Pity dwell
There God is dwelling too.
William Blake
You and I are children of One Religion and it is the Spirit. Kahlil Gibran
"All the words I utter
And all the words I write
Must spread out their wings untiring
And never rest in flight"
W.B.Yeats
Ignorance is the curse of God. Knowledge is the wing wherewith we fly to Heaven.
William Shakespeare
"Amongst all is the One Light. You are that Light.
By this illumination, that Light is radiant within all" Guru Nanak
"I AM AWAKE" Buddha
"Wine is the most perfect image of Liberating Gnosis" Frithjof Schuon
"The illumined soul drinks only the wine of Light" Sultan Walad
We are awakened through poetry
We are affirmed through ritual
We are fulfilled through music
Confucius
