Hafiz has long been one of my favorite poets. I first discovered
him when I was in college via Goethe and Ralph Waldo Emerson, and I've
been readng his poems ever since. Since I am (alas!) without Parsi, I'm
unable to read Hafiz in the original, and must rely upon the kindness
of translators.
Daniel Ladinsky has done an interesting job of rendering
Hafiz's verse into English. Ladinsky has an ear for rhythm and he strikes
me as an individual with deep spiritual sensibilities. When he renders
one of Hafiz's couplets as "The body a tree./God a wind", one
senses that there's more going into this translation than just philological
expertise. Landinsky, like Hafiz, is a mystic.
That spiritual bond with Hafiz, as well as a shared joy
in the sheer vitality of creation, makes Landinsky's renderings light-hearted,
in the sense that they shimmer with what Hafiz would call God's Light.
Some of my favorite examples: "Whenever/God lays His glance/Life
starts/Clapping"; "What is the beginning of/Happiness?/It is
to stop being/So religious"; "All the talents of God are within
you./How could this be otherwise/When your soul/Derived from His/Genes!"
Hafiz Books
HAFIZ: TONGUE OF THE HIDDEN
Poems from the Divan.
English Versions by Paul Smith.
Illustrations by Dale Hickey.
LOVE’S PERFECT GIFT: Rubaiyat of Hafiz.
English Versions by Paul Smith.
Illustrations by Ali Dowlatshahi.
HAFIZ: TONGUE OF THE HIDDEN
Poems from the Divan.
English Versions by Paul Smith.
Illustrations by Dale Hickey.
SADI: THE BOOK OF LOVE
Translated by Sir Edwin Arnold
THE BOOK OF LOVE is the third chapter of the BUSTAN or ORCHARD one of
the major books by the Persian Sufi/Master Poet Sadi of Shiraz. The full
title of the chapter could be translated as ‘Of Love, Divine Madness
and God-Intoxication’. Through its stories in the poetic form it
tells of many lovers on various levels of consciousness on the path to
God. Written in 1257 A.D. it is considered to be one of the pivital works
of Sufism.
DIVAN OF SADI: His Mystical Love-Poetry.
English Versions by Paul Smith
Sadi’s mystical love poetry, his ghazals, although almost unknown
in the West, are loved by his fellow-countrymen almost as much as those
of Hafiz whom he greatly influenced.
Here for the first time in English they can be read in all their beauty
and power and spirit. ALL of the wonderful 603 ghazals from Sadi’s
Badayi and Tayyibat have been translated in clear, modern, meaningful,
correct-rhyming English. Included is an Introduction containing The Life
of Sadi, his Poetry and his influence on the East and the West.
