A vivid depiction of the powerful religious forces that Rumi transcended to reveal “the sound of one soul speaking.”
An appreciative biography of the 13th-century Persian poet, teacher, and mystic.
In researching the life of Rumi (1207-1273), Gooch (English/William Paterson Univ.; Smash Cut: A Memoir of Howard and Art and the ’70s and the ’80s, 2015, etc.) traced the poet’s steps through the Middle East, immersed himself in scholarship, and, impressively, spent years learning Persian in order to translate Rumi’s works and contemporary accounts of a poet who came to achieve enormous international popularity for his “emphasis on ecstasy and love over religions and creeds.” Born into privilege, the son of a religious teacher, Rumi was an eager student of history, philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, Arabic grammar, commentaries on the Quran, and religious law; he attended the most respected colleges, preparing to become “a religious jurist and guider of souls.” As Genghis Khan, and later his grandson, rampaged through the Middle East, Rumi was determined to rise above the “churning realpolitik of the Mongols,” confident that a higher power shaped historical events. His career as a scholar and teacher altered radically when he met Shams of Tabriz, “a singular outlier mystic in a history crowded with extreme religious seekers.” Shams was rude and uncompromising, opposite in personality from the gentle Rumi, but the two formed an intense bond, which Gooch sees as the essential secret of Rumi’s life and work. They withdrew together for many months, inciting jealousy among Rumi’s family. Shams goaded Rumi into sloughing off erudition and looking into his heart, introducing him to music, dance, extreme fasting, and ecstatic whirling. Gooch is generous in portraying 60-year-old Shams’ marriage to Rumi’s teenage stepdaughter as inspired by “late-life blossoming of desire,” despite evidence of the man’s oppressive treatment of his young wife, which ended in her suspicious death. After two and a half years, Shams disappeared, possibly murdered, and Rumi despaired. But his influence lasted for the rest of the poet’s life, emerging in an outpouring of verse, which Gooch explores with passion and insight.
A vivid depiction of the powerful religious forces that Rumi transcended to reveal “the sound of one soul speaking.”Pub Date: Jan. 17, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-06-199914-7
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 5, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2016
Skilled and graceful exploration of the soul of an astonishing human being.
Full-immersion journalist Kidder (Home Town, 1999, etc.) tries valiantly to keep up with a front-line, muddy-and-bloody general in the war against infectious disease in Haiti and elsewhere.
The author occasionally confesses to weariness in this gripping account—and why not? Paul Farmer, who has an M.D. and a Ph.D. from Harvard, appears to be almost preternaturally intelligent, productive, energetic, and devoted to his causes. So trotting alongside him up Haitian hills, through international airports and Siberian prisons and Cuban clinics, may be beyond the capacity of a mere mortal. Kidder begins with a swift account of his first meeting with Farmer in Haiti while working on a story about American soldiers, then describes his initial visit to the doctor’s clinic, where the journalist felt he’d “encountered a miracle.” Employing guile, grit, grins, and gifts from generous donors (especially Boston contractor Tom White), Farmer has created an oasis in Haiti where TB and AIDS meet their Waterloos. The doctor has an astonishing rapport with his patients and often travels by foot for hours over difficult terrain to treat them in their dwellings (“houses” would be far too grand a word). Kidder pauses to fill in Farmer’s amazing biography: his childhood in an eccentric family sounds like something from The Mosquito Coast; a love affair with Roald Dahl’s daughter ended amicably; his marriage to a Haitian anthropologist produced a daughter whom he sees infrequently thanks to his frenetic schedule. While studying at Duke and Harvard, Kidder writes, Farmer became obsessed with public health issues; even before he’d finished his degrees he was spending much of his time in Haiti establishing the clinic that would give him both immense personal satisfaction and unsurpassed credibility in the medical worlds he hopes to influence.
Skilled and graceful exploration of the soul of an astonishing human being.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2003
ISBN: 0-375-50616-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2003
A standout immigrant coming-of-age story.
In her first nonfiction book, novelist Grande (Dancing with Butterflies, 2009, etc.) delves into her family’s cycle of separation and reunification.
Raised in poverty so severe that spaghetti reminded her of the tapeworms endemic to children in her Mexican hometown, the author is her family’s only college graduate and writer, whose honors include an American Book Award and International Latino Book Award. Though she was too young to remember her father when he entered the United States illegally seeking money to improve life for his family, she idolized him from afar. However, she also blamed him for taking away her mother after he sent for her when the author was not yet 5 years old. Though she emulated her sister, she ultimately answered to herself, and both siblings constantly sought affirmation of their parents’ love, whether they were present or not. When one caused disappointment, the siblings focused their hopes on the other. These contradictions prove to be the narrator’s hallmarks, as she consistently displays a fierce willingness to ask tough questions, accept startling answers, and candidly render emotional and physical violence. Even as a girl, Grande understood the redemptive power of language to define—in the U.S., her name’s literal translation, “big queen,” led to ridicule from other children—and to complicate. In spelling class, when a teacher used the sentence “my mamá loves me” (mi mamá me ama), Grande decided to “rearrange the words so that they formed a question: ¿Me ama mi mamá? Does my mama love me?”
A standout immigrant coming-of-age story.Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4516-6177-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: June 11, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2012
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