FitzGerald wields the pen with the same careful and masterly precision with which a great sculptor wields his chisel. Indeed, had Michaelangelo chosen to do a hundred smaller works, rather than a smaller number of monumental David's, Pieta's, etc., then walking through a gallery full of those miniatures would approximate the feeling one gets wandering around among the Rubaiyat's 114 stanzas.

Here we turn our attention to some of the defining technical features of a literary masterpiece, just as we might focus on such things as development, transition and re-capitulation in a symphony, or examine characteristics like balance, counterpoise, and symmetry in a work of visual art.

Alliteration:  repetition of initial sounds in neighboring words

With regard to Alliteration and Internal Rhyme, it is likely that a great many of the weaker instances were not consciously intended by the poet. Of those in this category some are undoubtedly completely accidental, while others may have been subconsciously intentional, especially in the case of FitzGerald. Composing without the extremely tight anagramming constraint, where wider latitude was possible in the selection of different words with which to express an idea, his innate sense of beautiful sound undoubtedly guided his choices. No attempt has been made to sort out which of these three categories all the various examples fall into, since it would be largely a matter of guesswork.

All of these phenomena are repetitions of various elements.

Alliteration and Internal Rhyme involve either pure phonemes or phonemic combinations of at most one syllable in length. Both function to impart a certain lingusitic lustre to a poetic work. They are the equivalent of surface detail and polish in a work of sculpture.

Extreme Contrast and Phrase Refelection are dramatic devices that correspond to counterpoise and symmetry.

Word Reflection, Echoing, and Anticipation are what give unity to the work. You will observe that Reflection is the one phenomenon out of the seven that is to a large degree missing from Brodie's version (FitzGerald has 77 instances, Brodie 21). FitzGerald's extreme fondness for the interverse re-use of words and phrases is something which is difficult to reproduce in an anagrammatic treatment, where one needs very wide latitude in word selection in order to achieve the goals of correct scansion, rhyme, and alliteration. However, this deficiency is more than made up for by Anticipation, in which words from subsequent or preceding verses of the original are incorporated into the anagram. For by means of this stylistic device both versions are integrally and inseparably tied to one another.