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hilaritas 's review for:
The Essential Rumi
by Rumi
Rumi is an amazing poet of mystical friendship, using the elements of humor, soaring natural metaphors and earthy, sometimes surprisingly scatological or sexual ones, to obliterate the categories that separate us from union with the cosmic divinity. However, the effectiveness of this volume is hampered by two things: (a) the fact that Barks is "interpreting" Rumi rather than translating him, which really shows at times (e.g., I don't think a 13th century Sufi mystic was really talking about synchronicities), and (b) that the new material in this edition is, with the exception of a couple short pieces, almost wholly superfluous. It's worth reading because I still value elements of Barks' vision of Rumi as pan-ecumenical mystical trickster and his ability to draw out the humor and surprise in the works, but read warily as this hybrid work is almost certainly as much a creation of its interpreter as its source. If you can, just grab a used version of the older edition, as the new version is just a bloated cash-grab and now overlong.