Croken: Found in Translation-- How a Thirteenth Century Islamic Poet Conquered America
Ryan Croken on translating the mystical poet Rumi, and on how Muslims are translated and mistranslated in America.
Jalal al-Din Rumi was born in Afghanistan, wrote mainly in Persian, and lived much of his life in Konya, in what is now Turkey. He has some mixed Persian/ Arabic and Persian/ Greek verses, as well.
Coleman Barks's transmogrifications of Rumi have made him the best-selling poet in contemporary America, with tens of thousands of volumes sold.
Cont'd (click below or on "comments")
This phenomenon recalls the popularity around the turn of the century of Omar Khayyam, another medieval Persian poet, who, however, was known for being a closet atheist, cynic and libertine rather than a neoplatonic mystic and moralist like Rumi. Khayyam was an astronomer and scientist; Rumi was a court judge who dealt with people's problems every day. Although Fitzgerald's loose translation of Khayyam sometimes caught some of his spirit, in other instances he reversed the poet's meaning. Khayyam at one point castigates people who believe in astrology and think that their fates are determined by the planets. Khayyam, being an astronomer well aware of the laws of motion as then understood, observes that planets and stars "are a thousand times more helpless" than human beings. Fitzgerald reverses his meaning and delivers him into a supposed Oriental fatalism. I think upper crust Westerners inclined to secularism and a little fun used Khayyam as a foil to the evangelicals of Victorian times. Nowadays Americans use Rumi for spiritual individualism.
My favorite Rumi anecdote, and I can't remember now where I heard it or how solid it is, concerns his exchange with a general. The story goes that a military man criticized Rumi and other mystics for devoting themselves to imaginary matters like spirituality and miracles. Rumi is said to have replied that generals devote their lives to fighting massive battles and spreading death and bloodshed over borders between countries, and what could be more imaginary than a border demarcating territory. It is just in the mind, after all. And, spirituality, Rumi said, at least doesn't kill anyone.
For more on Rumi and his life see Franlin Lewis's "Rumi--Past and Present, East and West: The Life, Teachings, and Poetry of Jalal al-Din Rumi".
posted by Juan Cole @ 1/28/2009 12:15:00 PM
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18 Comments:
how can coleman barks "translate" rumi when he doesn't even know persian.
in order to "translate" he calls on persian speaking people to give him a rough idea of what rumi says and then warps it to his own agenda.
you were right to say his "translations" are transmogrifications and that is being generous.
a.n.d.
There's a fantastic movie from 2005 called "The Keeper: The Legend of Omar Khayyam:"
Kamran is a 12 year old boy in the present day who discovers that his ancestor is the 11th Century Mathematician, Astronomer, Poet of Persia, Omar Khayyam. The story has been passed down in his family from one generation to another, and now it is his responsibility to keep the story alive for future generations. The film takes us from the modern day to the epic past where the relationship between Omar Khayyam, Hassan Sabbah (the original creator of the sect of Assassins) and their mutual love for a beautiful woman separate them from their eternal bond of friendship. Filmed almost entirely on location in Samarkand and Bukhara, Uzbekistan.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0294806/
Written and directed by Kayvan Mashayekh.
Vanessa Redgrave has a small but crucial role as well.
One of the best historical documentaries I've seen in a while. (The best being "The Twenties in Colour" from the BBC, documenting the world in previously unknown color photos and film footage the world over in the 1920's.)
Your post serendipitously coincided with the local broadest of Rick Steve's "Iran" on PBS last night. Though he was shepherded by a gov't minder, he managed to put together a tour of Iran that was no wholly sterile. Two of the themes of the program were the general goodwill felt by many Iranians towards the American people and their appreciation and passion for their own poetic traditions. It struck me as strange that in a country where a man who was not a family member could not even shake hands with a woman, that there existed a tolerance the poetry of romantic love. It just goes to show you the power of the human spirit to thrive in the most withered on grounds.
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I will check out Lewis on Rumi. I have always enjoyed OK, having filled many a cup with wine, wine, red wine. Any recommended translation other than Fitzgerald?
I recommend anyone interested in Rumi to look up Prof. Fatemeh Keshavarz's book: "Reading Mystical Lyric" on Rumi.
Her more recent book Jasmine and Stars: Reading More than Lolita in Tehran is also a good choice for readers interested in the literature of Iran.
She is Professor and Chair of the Asian and Near Eastern Languages Dept. at Washington Univ. where I also study.
Good luck! Thanks Dr. Cole for mentioning our favorite mystic.
Professor Cole thanks for your post on Rumi
Since at the time of Mawlānā Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Balkhī there was no Afghanistan and he wrote, sang, talked and danced in his birth language Persian It should be easy to say he was Persian, or as the other famous Persian poet Firdawsī who is also from Khorasan and not far from where Rumi was born likes to call this group of western Asians, Iranians. Some how in western academic circles it is difficult to relate the historic Persian personalities with their culture, language, time and place of their birth.
Here is Wikipedia’s entry about Rumi:
Mawlānā Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Balkhī (مولانا جلال الدین محمد بلخى), also known as Jalāl ad-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī (جلالالدین محمد رومی), but known to the English-speaking world simply as Rumi (30 September 1207 – 17 December 1273), was a 13th-century Persian poet, Sunni Islamic jurist, and theologian. Rūmī is a descriptive name meaning "the Roman" since he lived most of his life in an area called Rūm because it was once ruled by the Byzantine Empire. According to tradition, Rumi was born in Balkh, Bactria, in contemporary Afghanistan, which at that time was part of the Persian Empire.
What Coleman Barks does in working from a series of translations and transliterations done by others to make his own version of Rumi's poems is a technique that has been employed by poet/translators for many, many years. Witter Byner and Ursula K. LeGuin have translated Lao Tzu using a similar approach and have brought something valuable to our understanding of the Tao.
As someone who loves dabbling in language, I prefer editions which include the original version with the translation so that I can learn a little about the language in question and compare and contrast the translation, sometimes even working out my own for myself.
To criticize Barks for his methods is to be ignorant of how translation takes place. Barks obviously loves Rumi's work and enjoys sharing it with others. [I've seen him read and can personally attest to this.] Some of them will go back to the source and be rewarded even more. Most of us will stay with Barks and other English translations for our own relationship with Rumi. It is a gift either way.
Interesting that, the distinction between spirituality and religiosity, or piety. Perhaps we, and by that I mean all "believers", who subscribe to the existence of a deity, need to focus our efforts on improving our own awareness of what this is. I find that those characterized as "fundamentalists" or "extremists" often adhere to a sort of an aggressively militant piety, exclusive to themselves, and full of condemnation of "unbelievers". Rumi, whilst no less empirical-minded than the most vaunted Islamic scholars, had a beautiful, humanist touch, sorely lacking in modern Islamic rhetoric. We Muslims seem to have publicly misplaced (hopefully temporarily) our collective inheritance of tolerance, compassion, love of wisdom and intellectual curiosity. Qur'an has taught us so much, yet we are failing to appreciate the most important lesson of all: the mercy of our Creator, evident in the beginning of everything we intend to do.
Paul H at 3:09pm perpetuates a common false generalization about Iran: that women and men "cannot" shake hands. I lived in Iran for two years, I am a "khareji", and can attest that what Paul says is true only for conservatives and government officials - and I can even say I shook hands with female government officials, in their offices. Among educated people - in northern Tehran, for example - there is not an issue about men and women shaking hands, working together, etc. Mind you, I am not defending the neanderthals who run the country.
Kooshy, What are you tring to say here? Professor Cole made no comment on his nationality, simply his place of birth, which is indeed Balkh, Afghanistan. And since when was Wikipedia a reliable academic source? Any Joe on the street could alter that article as they see fit, myself included. Following your own logic any thinker, poet, writer born under Persian rule, from North Africa to India, would then be Persian too? Simply because he wrote in the language (which by the way was Dari, not Persian) does not make him Persian... Particularly in the way you are using the word, as an ethnic moniker, not a linguistic one. It’s such a familiar attitude among Persians. It’s as if these cultures, Arab, Afghan, Turkish, etc. had nothing to contribute themselves, and that it was great Persia brought them light. This type of pig-headedness has no place in today’s world, and it should especially have no place in academic discourse. I congratulate these “Western academic circles” for being able to separate fact from the racially driven and antiquated ways of thinking that people like you cling to.
he was Persian, or as the other famous Persian poet Firdawsī who is also from Khorasan and not far from where Rumi was born likes to call this group of western Asians, Iranians. Some how in western academic circles it is difficult to relate the historic Persian personalities with their culture, language, time and place of their birth.
Agreed. In fact, when they are told that Rumi was Persian/Iranian, they are disappointed...I guess because Iranians have been demonized/portrayed a muslim fanatics...
Afghanistan was part of Iran a mere 250 years ago.
Be sure to watch this documentary on PBS:
Excerpts of a PBS Independent Lens film, one of a series which will start airing on PBS starting March 17, 2009. See detalils and trailers here:
http://www.iranian.com/main/2009/jan/arusi-persian-wedding
Persian community in the US:
http://www.iranian.com/main/node
My source was entirely limited to the content of the program. Steves' frequently referenced that people's behavior was influenced by both the presence of western cameras and a gov't minder so that probably explains the cautious behavior.
Dear Paul: Steve Rick did a magnificent job, however, for one reason or another, he tried to portray Iranian lower middle class, which tend to be more religious. To a large extent, the Iranian culture is dictated by social/economic standing of a highly stratified society. The gap between the rich and the poor have widened since the revolution.
Visit www.Iranian.com on a regular basis if you are interested to get an idea of the diversities of attitudes, opinions, culture, and so on.
Jalal ad-Din ar-Rumi was an orthodox, Sunni Muslim and a scholar in the Hanafi school of legal jurisprudence (the same school as the Deobandi movement which produced the Taliban). I find it intellectually dishonest, to say the least, how figures like Coleman Barks try to misrepresent and distort Rumi and his writings to fit a sort of New Age, universalist ideology. To play down or ignore Rumi's role of as a devout Muslim scholar and jurist is to deny who he truly was and what he stood for. I think it is a great disservice to the Mawlana to misrepresent his grounding in Islam and make out to be something he never was. I think it is great that many in the West wish to pay homage to a poetic and spiritual genius like Mawlana Rumi, just as the West pays homage to Averroës (ibn Rushd), Avicenna (ibn Sina), al-Ghazali, 'Umar Khayyam, and many other great Muslim scientists and philosophers, but it should not be done at the expense of the religious tradition (i.e. Islam) that made Rumi who he was. I think a good book is "Rumi and Islam" by Ibrahim Gamard.
Also not to be missed: Annemarie Schimmel's *The Triumphal Sun.* My copy is from Fine Books, London, 1978, and is part of the Persian Studies Series, Eshan Yarshater (Columbia U.), general editor.
Some of the debate over whether Rumi was "New Age," "orthodox," etc. misses the significance of mysticism that informed Rumi's faith and poetry. In every religion there are those who trend intellectual, and those whose faith is based on experience of an Absolute. Rumi was the latter, which makes him insightful, unafraid, and joyfully transgressive. New Agers and Pharisees alike make do w/ less, which is why those like Rumi who have actually seen the territory (not just read the map) have such staying power.
Recommended reading:
"The Original Rubaiyyat of Omar Khayyam"
In a new translation with critical commentaries by Robert Graves and Omar Ali-Shah.
Doubleday 1968
Also, all six books of Rumi's Mathnawi are available online.
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