February 11, 2003
Contact: George Yatchisin
(805) 893-3494
e-mail: yatchisin-g@ sa.ucsb.edu
Noted poet and translator Coleman Barks presents a moving and mystical evening, Rumi and the Play of Poetry, at UCSB Campbell Hall
Summary Facts:
- Coleman Barks
- Rumi and the Play of Poetry
- Barks is the foremost translator of Persian mystic Jelaluddin Rumi
- Rumi is currently the best-selling poet in North America
- Barks will be accompanied by musicians Barry and Shelly Phillips
- Barks is a Distinguished Visiting Fellow in the UCSB College of Creative Studies
- Thursday, March 13
- 8 pm / UCSB Campbell Hall
- General: $15 / UCSB students: $10
- Tickets/Information: UCSB Arts & Lectures at 893-3535
Noted translator and poet Coleman Barks, a Distinguished Visiting Fellow in the UCSB College of Creative Studies, will present the evening Rumi and the Play of Poetry on Thursday, March 13 at 8 pm in UCSB Campbell Hall. Jelaluddin Rumi, a 13th century, Afghan-born Sufi mystic, is a poet as famous in the Islamic world as Shakespeare is in the West. Coleman Barks’s fresh and original translations of Rumi’s work are largely responsible for Rumi becoming the best-selling poet in North America. Barks has published 17 volumes of Rumi’s poetry since 1976, including The Essential Rumi in 1995 and the recently released Rumi: The Book of Love. Barks’s intense and artful translations convey Rumi’s insights into the human heart and its longings with passion and daring. This very special evening will feature Barks performing the spiritual and beautiful words of Rumi, accompanied by musicians Barry and Shelly Phillips. Author and meditation teacher Jack Kornfield claims, “Perhaps the world’s greatest poet, the gold of Rumi pours down through Barks’s words.”
Born and raised in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Barks went to school at the University of North Carolina and at UC, Berkeley. He taught poetry and creative writing at the University of Georgia for 30 years. In 1976 poet Robert Bly introduced Barks to the work of Rumi. Barks began translating the mystic’s poetry at this time, and the following year he started to study with Sufi master Bawa Muhaiyaddeen to deepen his faith and appreciation of Rumi’s culture. His first full-length collection of Rumi’s work, Open Secret, was awarded a Pushcart Writer’s Choice Award by judge William Stafford. Barks’s work with Rumi was the subject of an hour-long segment in Bill Moyers’s Language of Life series on PBS, and Moyers also included Barks in his acclaimed public television series Fooling with Words. Barks’s translations of Rumi have sold over half million copies.
This special performance will also feature Barry Phillips on cello, tabla and percussion and Shelley Phillips on double-reeds, harp, harmonium and flutes. Both musicians studied at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and are recording artists for the Gourd music label. “Rumi’s poetry was always accompanied by music and movement,” Barks has said in an interview, pointing out that Rumi was a Sufi “whirling dervish.” He adds, “I’ve tried to put the music and the movement back together to get the poems to a deeper place in the psyche. I love to experiment and see how the music opens the poem up.”
Courtesy of the UCSB Bookstore, books by Coleman Barks will be available for purchase and signing at the event. This reading is co-presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures and the UCSB College of Creative Studies and sponsored by KEYT 1250 AM.
Tickets for this presentation by Coleman Barks are $15 for the general public and $10 for UCSB students and are on sale now at the A&L Ticket Office.
For tickets or more information,
call UCSB Arts & Lectures at (805) 893-3535.
Editor: For photos, please call
George Yatchisin at (805) 893-3494.