Coleman Barks Presents Works by Persian Mystic Rumi

Celebrating the Spoken Word

To kick off National Poetry Month, here is a presentation by Coleman Barks reading his translations of the poetry of the 13th century persian mystic, Rumi. Barks has related the story of how he began his translations. Robert Bly handed him a book of Rumi's poetry and told him, "These poems need to be released from their cages." The book was a translation by the British academic, A.J. Arberry, who was a Persian scholar but not a poet. Barks then began over the next twenty years meeting with scholars of the Persian language who could translate Rumi's words which Barks would in turn craft into free verse poems.

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