Books by Coleman Barks
Rumi: The Big Red Book: The Great Masterpiece Celebrating Mystical Love and Friendship
“Really, what other book would anyone ever need?” —Naomi Shihab Nye, author of Honeybee
“Elegant and exquisite.” —Deepak Chopra, author of Muhammad, Jesus, and Buddha
The Big Red Book is a poetic masterpiece from Jalaluddin Rumi, the medieval Sufi mystic whom Time magazine calls “the most popular poet in America.” Readers continue to be awed and inspired by Rumi’s masterfully lyrical, deeply expressive poems, collected in volumes such as The Illustrated Rumi, The Soul of Rumi, and the bestselling The Essential Rumi. With The Big Red Book, acclaimed poet and Rumi interpreter Coleman Barks offers a never-before-published translation of a crucial anthology of poems widely considered to be one of Persian literature’s greatest treasures.
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Rumi: The Big Red Book: The Great Masterpiece Celebrating Mystical Love and Friendship
“Really, what other book would anyone ever need?” —Naomi Shihab Nye, author of Honeybee
“Elegant and exquisite.” —Deepak Chopra, author of Muhammad, Jesus, and Buddha
The Big Red Book is a poetic masterpiece from Jalaluddin Rumi, the medieval Sufi mystic whom Time magazine calls “the most popular poet in America.” Readers continue to be awed and inspired by Rumi’s masterfully lyrical, deeply expressive poems, collected in volumes such as The Illustrated Rumi, The Soul of Rumi, and the bestselling The Essential Rumi. With The Big Red Book, acclaimed poet and Rumi interpreter Coleman Barks offers a never-before-published translation of a crucial anthology of poems widely considered to be one of Persian literature’s greatest treasures.
Copies
No copies available.
Rumi: The Book of Love: Poems of Ecstasy and Longing
Rumi: The Book of Love is a collection of astonishing poems for lovers from the mystic Rumi, by the translator who made him sing anew, Coleman Barks.
Poetry and Rumi fans will want to own this gorgeously packaged compilation of love poems by the thirteenth-century Sufi mystic. Rumi is best known and most cherished as the poet of love in all its forms, and renowned poet and Rumi interpretor Coleman Barks has gathered the best of these poems in delightful and wise renderings that will open your heart and soul to the lover inside and out.
Copies
No copies available.
Rumi: The Book of Love: Poems of Ecstasy and Longing
Rumi: The Book of Love is a collection of astonishing poems for lovers from the mystic Rumi, by the translator who made him sing anew, Coleman Barks.
Poetry and Rumi fans will want to own this gorgeously packaged compilation of love poems by the thirteenth-century Sufi mystic. Rumi is best known and most cherished as the poet of love in all its forms, and renowned poet and Rumi interpretor Coleman Barks has gathered the best of these poems in delightful and wise renderings that will open your heart and soul to the lover inside and out.
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$16.99
The Drowned Book: Ecstatic and Earthy Reflections of Bahauddin, the Father of Rumi
The Lost Words of the Sufi Master and Father of Rumi
Bahauddin, Rumi's father, was not only a major force in the development of Islamic spirituality, but also a deeply influential force in his son's life. In this, the first ever substantial English version of a wonderful but virtually unknown book, Bahauddin proves to be a daring, spiritual genius. His voice comes through the delightful, passionate craft of Coleman Barks, who transforms the Persian translations of John Moyne into fresh spiritual literature.
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The Drowned Book: Ecstatic and Earthy Reflections of Bahauddin, the Father of Rumi
Bahauddin, Rumi's father, was not only a major force in the development of Islamic spirituality, but also deeply influential in his son's life. This delightful and provocative collection reveals the depth of thirteenth-century Sufi mystical wisdom and its acute observations into nature, humanity, and the mysteries of life. Full of wit and insight, Bahauddin's notes bring to the reader a deeper understanding of his son Rumi's spiritual and intellectual heritage.
After his father's death in 1231, Rumi carried his father's spiritual notebook, known as the Maarif, everywhere. The writer Aflaki tells this story of the meeting of Rumi and Shams: Rumi is sitting by a fountain in Konya talking to his students with the Maarif open on the fountain's ledge. Suddenly, Shams interrupts the conversation and pushes the precious text into the water.
"Who are you and why are you doing this?" asks Rumi, protesting that this copy of his father's diary is the only one in existence.
Shams replies, "It is time for you to live what you have been reading of and talking about. But if you want, we can retrieve the book. It will be perfectly dry. See?" And he lifts Bahauddin's notebook out, "Dry."
Rumi set aside his father's book and joined Shams; but now, in this first-ever translation of the vital passages of the Maarif, renowned poet Coleman Barks and Persian scholar John Moyne open a window into the world of Rumi, the young man who became one of the world's best-loved poets and great spiritual teachers.
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A Year with Rumi: Daily Readings
Coleman Barks has played a central role in making the Sufi mystic Rumi the most popular poet in the world. A Year with Rumi brings together 365 of Barks's elegant and beautiful translations of Rumi's greatest poems, including fifteen never-before-published poems.
Barks includes an Introduction that sets Rumi in his context and an Afterword musing on poetry of the mysterious and the sacred. Join Coleman Barks and Rumi for a year-long journey into the mystical and sacred within and without. Join them in recognizing and embracing the divine in the sublime, in the ordinary, and in us all.
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The Soul of Rumi: A New Collection of Ecstatic Poems
The Soul of Rumi is renowned poet Coleman Barks' first major assemblage of newly translated Rumi poems since his bestselling The Essential Rumi.
Coleman Barks presents entirely new translations of Rumi's poems, published for the first time in The Soul of Rumi. The poems range over the breadth of Rumi's themes: silence, emptiness, play, God, peace, grief, sexuality, music, to name just a few. But the focus is on the ecstatic experience of human and divine love and their inseparability, conveyed with Rumi's signature passion, daring, and insights into the human heart and the heart's longings.
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Rumi: Bridge to the Soul: Journeys into the Music and Silence of the Heart
Originally released in 2007, "Year of Rumi," to coincide with the poet's 800th birthday, by the pre-eminent Rumi poet Coleman Barks.
In Rumi: Bridge to the Soul,Coleman Barks—who holds an honorary doctorate in Persian language and literature by the University of Tehran for his decades-long translations of Rumi—has collected and translated ninety new poems, most of them never published before in any form. The "bridge" in the title is a reference to the Khajou Bridge in Isphahan, Iran, which Barks visited with Robert Bly in May of 2006—a trip that in many ways prompted this book. The "soul bridge" also suggests Rumi himself, who crosses cultures and religions and brings us all together to listen to his words, regardless of origin or creed.
Open this book and let Rumi's poetry carry you into the interior silence and joy of the spirit, the place that unites conscious knowing with a deeper, more soulful understanding.
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Rumi: Soul Fury: Rumi and Shams Tabriz on Friendship
A seminal collection of poetry from the medieval Sufi mystic—the most popular poet in America—and his “soul friend,” Shams Tabriz, which illuminate the evocative and deeply spiritual dimensions of friendship and love, compiled by the foremost Rumi translator and author of The Essential Rumi, Coleman Barks.
In this stunning translation, Coleman Barks brings to light Rumi’s theme of “love as religion”—that to reach its most profound depths requires mindful practice—as well as love in its most meaningful form: soul friendship. These short poems by both Rumi and Shams Tabriz, rich in beauty and spiritual insight, capture the delight and the impermanence of these bonds that pierce deep into the human mind, heart, and soul.
Rumi’s poetry is honored and enjoyed by many traditions and cultures. Today, many people from all walks of life have moved beyond traditional notions of spirituality, embracing a sense of the sacred that transcends a singular religion, belief, or text. Rumi’s poetry speaks to them and nourishes their divine yearnings. Joyous and contemplative, provocative and playful, Rumi: Soul Fury is a sterling addition to the modern Rumi oeuvre, and is sure to be embraced by his wide and devoted readership.
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Winter Sky: New and Selected Poems, 1968-2008 (Brown Thrasher Books Ser.)
As the foremost translator of thirteenth-century mystic poet Jalal Al-Din Rumi, Coleman Barks reaches a devoted, inspired, and ever-widening international audience. Yet the foundation for Barks's work as a translator is his own significant body of work as a poet. Winter Sky offers a selection from Barks's seven previously published books combined with a group of new poems.
Barks's open-hearted, free verse poetry is infused with a joy of the spirit at play with the forms of the world. His journey through life is deeply embedded in his work. The poems spring directly from experience and engage with subjects such as the elation and struggle of having and raising children, grief over the deaths of loved ones, the transition from parent to grandparent, or the changing nature and intensity of desire. Barks's open letter to President Bush, written days before the invasion of Iraq and widely circulated online, is a poetic plea for peace, offering a startling and moving alternative to war.
Whether it is the childhood excitement of being named best athlete at summer camp or the early signs of dementia at the age of seventy, Barks uses the personal to convey the universal. The unique flow of a life is here in poems that are rueful, confused, torn, and grateful, but always informed by Barks's transcendent sense of joy and playfulness.
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Hummingbird Sleep: Poems, 2009-2011
The poems inHummingbird Sleep move associatively between Coleman Barks's personal experience and his extensive reading, weaving together a wild and eclectic range of material. A discussion of Plotinus, Barks's appearance on PBS NewsHour, a note Keats once left on Wordsworth's mantelpiece, a splinter in the heel, and a quote from the Upanishads-all make their way into Barks's most recent poems, which achieve intimacy and expansiveness at the same time.
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This Longing Poetry, Teaching Stories, and Letters of Rumi
by Coleman Barks, John Moyne, Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi
This Rumi collection features selections from one of the world's great spiritual masterpieces, the Mathnawi. The Mathnawi consists of six volumes of poetry in rhyme—over fifty-one thousand verses—inspired by folklore, the Qur'an, stories of saints and teachers, and sayings of Muhammed. Rendered by Rumi's premier English translators, these excerpts from the Mathnawi are presented in American free-verse style.
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