Content area
Full text
Michael Sellss poetically inspired translation and critical edition of a collection of erotic poems by Muhyī al-Dīn Ibn cArabī (d. 638/1240) marks, in one signifi-cant way, a new era in English-language Islamic stud-ies-that of renewed literary translations. It is not, of course, the first such venture, as Jalāl al-Dīn Rūmīs poems-among others-have been translated several times. It is, however, indicative of the maturation of the study of Sufi poetry that readers of Arabic texts in Eng-lish feel that such a translation is needed, and needed it was. This is not because Reynold A. Nicholsons origi-nal translation of Tarjumān al-ashwāq (The translator of desires), undertaken in the early twentieth century (Lon-don: Royal Asiatic Society, 1911), suffered from glar-ing inaccuracies. It certainly had some. One particularly telling example is a word that Nicholson translates not from the poem itself, but from Ibn cArabīs later com-mentary on his poems, Dhakhāhr al-alāq (Priceless treasures; ed. Cairo, 1968), selections of which Nichol-son included in his translation. Nicholson renders Ibn cArabīs word for those who have privileged access to...