Customer Reviews

The Drop That Became the Sea: Lyric Poems

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Generally when we think of Sufi and Hindu devotional poetry a small set of names come to mind - Attar, Rumi, Kabir, Mirabai ...; Yunus Emre is certainly not among those names although he deserves to be. He composed in a Turkic language, a language family noted for its love of language, its wordplay and doubling. This is poetry of the highest quality with a down to earth touch resonating with divine love imagery. A must read for anyone interested in religious poetry, bhakti poetry or Sufism.

This was such a gem to discover that I felt the need to add to the only 2 reviews included so far. If you like Rumi and other such poets, I think you will equally adore this book despite their having very different styles. The best way to give you a quick sense of Yunus is that when Rumi asked him what he thought of Rumi's 6-book masterpiece, the Mathnawi, he simply said "It's a little long. I would have written it differently." "Oh, how so?" Rumi asked. "I would have written: I came from eternity, clothed myself with skin and bones and called myself 'Yunus'." What I love about these priceless treasures is that you get more and more from them each time you read them so the power and delight are literally endless - my ideal type of book.

I found this book by accident. I had read a single poem by Yunus Emre and, transfixed, I blindly ordered this book of translations by Helminski and Algan. This "sea" is beautiful and deep. His poetry expresses a deep personal mysticism and humanism and love for God. If you like Rumi, do yourself a favor and read this too.

Yunus Emre is perhaps the most well known Sufi poet in Turkey second only to Rumi. That is he little known outside of Turkey has no small part to do with that Rumi wrote in the Persian language, the primary language of the time and thus, guaranteed himself popularity in not just Turkey but Persia, Afghanistan and other Persian-Turkic speaking areas of the Muslim world. Yunus Emre wrote in Turkish and not the height Turkish of the royal courts of the time but rather the Turkish spoken by the ordinary Turkoman tribes of Anatolia.

In this respect he is similar to Pir Sultan Abdal, the Alevi-Shia Sufi poet whose poems are still sang and recited today by everyone from Alevis during their ceremonies to Sunni Sufi mystics to popular modern musicians (Such as Erdal Erzincan, Ozlem Ozdil and Gulay)

This book is but a short introduction to a Sufi who while well known in Turkey little is really known about. The book provides the reader with a short introduction to Yunus Emre with a brief (about 1 and a half page) biography of the man to a brief introduction to the teachings of Yunus Emre (a controversial issue in itself as many modern Turkish scholars have pointed out that 1. Many poems that have been attributed to Yunus Emre are in fact fake and 2. Over the centuries there have been several "Yunus Emre's" so there is no little confusion as to who is the 'authentic' Yunus Emre.

The translation is based upon the work of the late Turkish scholar Abdulbaki Golpinarli. It should be pointed out however that while he is recognised as one of the most respected scholars of Turkish and Persian Sufism of the last century his own personal Shia beliefs have often clouded some of his writings (His books on Rumi for example have been criticised)

The poems are well translated and easy to read, similar in many respects to the popular so called 'translations' of the Mathnawi of Rumi. I recommend this book as a worthwhile introduction to Yunus Emre. There is almost nothing available in the English language on Yunus Emre or the Bektashi order (To which he probably belonged) So this hopefully will be the start of more to come.

I keep this little gem by my bed to have handy. Every poem is exquisite and enticing to read over and over again.

I love Yunus Emre The Turkish best poet about mystic poetries. I highly recommend: Get this book and read it. I am sure you 'll love him, too.