If It Rhymes, It Must Be True

Edward Fitzgerald's translation of Omar Khayyam's Rubaiyat is widely read and loved. This is at least partly because Fitzgerald made the effort of translating the Persian Quatrains into English ones, instead of doing a more direct and literal translation into prose. Because the poetry rhymes, it feels true.

Here's one where Khayyam mocks self-proclaimed prophets:

Why, all the Saints and Sages who discuss'd
Of the Two Worlds so wisely--they are thrust
Like foolish Prophets forth; their Words to Scorn
Are scatter'd, and their Mouths are stopt with Dust.

Here's one from a different translator, Justin McCarthy. This one is prose:

Seek the company of men with righteousness and understanding, and fly a thousand leagues from a man without wit. If a wise man giveth thee poison,  fear not to drink thereof, but if a fool offerth an antidote, pout it out upon the earth.

Why does the poetic translation grab our attention and have us nodding our heads in agreement? And why is the prose translation, on the other hand, preachy and forgettable?

Psychologists call this the rhyme-as-reason effect: things that rhyme feel more accurate than things that don't.

I suspect the effect arises because conveying a message through poetry takes more work than conveying it through prose. It takes skill and effort to put things into a rhyme scheme, and if the author has taken that trouble, maybe they have something important to say. The prose translation doesn't feel as elegant – the author could have knocked that out without much thought.

By fitting their work into a rhyme scheme, the author signals to us that the message has been carefully crafted, and thus what it conveys must be important.