Reading Mystical Lyric: The Case of Jalal Al-Din Rumi

The first ciritcal approach to Rumi’s canon of verse

Jalal al-Din Rumi, a towering figure in the Persian speaking world, is currently the most widely published poet in English translation. Yet despite the popularity of his verse, the majority of scholarship on his work focuses not on Rumi’s poetry but on his contributions as a mystic. Fatemeh Keshavarz’s pioneering study is the first extensive critical examination of this vast, dynamic body of literature. Through close readings of the Divan, his collection of more than 35,000 lyric verses, she explores Rumi’s extraordinary popular and critical literary success.