Songs for a Spiritual Traveler: Selected Poems (The Writings of Frithjof Schuon) [Paperback]

Frithjof Schuon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 6, 2003 | Series: The Writings of Frithjof Schuon

German/English bilingual collection - drawn from more than 3,000 poems written during the closing years of Schuon's life.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Anyone who is an artist concerned with the sacred should read him ... [His] work has meant so much to me." -- Sir John Tavener, composer and author

"He feeds my soul...as does no other living religious writer." -- Huston Smith, author, The World's Religions

"Schuon proves anew ... how inexhaustibly beautiful is the Truth." -- James Cutsinger, University of South Carolina

"The beauty of Schuon's poetry touches upon that luminous center where the way of knowledge and ... of love converge." -- Patrick Laude, Georgetown University

"These tender lyrics show the famous thinker in a very different light and from an unexpected side." -- Annemarie Schimmel, Professor Emeritus, Harvard University

Language Notes

Text: English, German (translation)
Original Language: German

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 168 pages
• Publisher: World Wisdom; Bilingual edition (September 6, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0941532313
• ISBN-13: 978-0941532310
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.3 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,035,817 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Born in Basle, Switzerland in 1907, Frithjof Schuon was the twentieth century's pre-eminent spokesman for the perennialist school of comparative religious thought.
The leitmotif of Schuon's work was foreshadowed in an encounter during his youth with a marabout who had accompanied some members of his Senegalese village to Basle for the purpose of demonstrating their African culture. When Schuon talked with him, the venerable old man drew a circle with radii on the ground and explained: "God is the center; all paths lead to Him." Until his later years Schuon traveled widely, from India and the Middle East to America, experiencing traditional cultures and establishing lifelong friendships with Hindu, Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, and American Indian spiritual leaders.
A philosopher in the tradition of Plato, Shankara, and Eckhart, Schuon was a gifted artist and poet as well as the author of over twenty books on religion, metaphysics, sacred art, and the spiritual path. Describing his first book, The Transcendent Unity of Religions, T. S. Eliot wrote, "I have met with no more impressive work in the comparative study of Oriental and Occidental religion", and world-renowned religion scholar Huston Smith said of Schuon, "The man is a living wonder; intellectually apropos religion, equally in depth and breadth, the paragon of our time". Schuon's books have been translated into over a dozen languages and are respected by academic and religious authorities alike.
More than a scholar and writer, Schuon was a spiritual guide for seekers from a wide variety of religions and backgrounds throughout the world. He died in 1998.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Rare Find, April 26, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Songs for a Spiritual Traveler: Selected Poems (The Writings of Frithjof Schuon) (Paperback)

In daily life, it is interesting to see how the human soul likes to return to an idea or a feeling that is simple but somehow determinative. It is often the inward image of someone we love or a goal we are striving for. Media advertising techniques exploit this aspect of our nature at its crudest level. In the art of poetry, it is turned to account in a kind of apotheosis that verges on the magical. It is no accident that for millennia-when illiteracy was the norm for most people-the wisdom of civilizations was encapsulated, perpetuated and enjoyed through poetry.

This collection of "Songs" is a rare find. There is no poem more than one page in length, and yet it is as though Schuon the metaphysician has crystallized the entire content of his philosophical books into verse. Even so, this is much more than simply a clever recapitulation. The ideas, the images-and the realities they manifest-spring forth with the life and clarity of a fresh inspiration. And this is the point at which those of us who are not fluent in German cannot help feeling slightly left out. One is grateful to have the original German next to the English translations, but one also longs to "hear the music." Lacking a voice rendering of the German in the form of a compact disk, one can hope that at least a few of these gems might become accessible through an internet site.

As with Schuon's prose works, one is struck by the range of subjects, and in addition with the poetry, by the astonishing variety of styles and meters. The topics include such diverse interests as metaphysics, cosmology, sacred art, celestial femininity, hagiography, comparative religion, folk wisdom, fairy tales and certainly all aspects of German romanticism. The sense of nature as theophany is a major theme here, accompanied by a lyricism of heart-melting beauty.

This is the kind of book one likes to dip into, savor and come back to. Since the foreword mentions a corpus of some 3,500 poems, the only question to ask is when the publication date is for the next volume.