The Masnavi, Book 2

This is the second book translated by Jawadi. I DO read Farsi (Persian) and this translation holds the meaning, the rhythm, and the soul of Rumi intact. The translation is almost verse for verse with none of the meaning lost. I use this book in a seminar where the text is read from the original Masnavi in Farsi. I use the book to glean a better understanding of the meaning. Our teachers also agree that this is a great translation. Even better than Nicholson. Nicholson is very dry. The Masnavi should be music to your senses. In this translation, it is.

An excellent new translation.

Simply love it, would highly recommend the book, all volumes.

That is the best translation of the Masnavi I have ever seen. It consists both the original idea and the rhyme.

I just recieved this. I read a couple of pages and I am so far satisfied. The translation seems decent the only thing I am afraid of is that the translator was only able convey the outer meaning of the text because he tried to make the lines rhyme. That's the difficulty I guess of translating prose. It's a choice between the beauty of the words and correctly and fully conveying the double, sometimes triple, meaning behind them. If I could read and understand Persian, even if only a little, I would buy the original in a heartbeat. It seems though the translator won awards for his translation(I think) of the first book of Masnavi so I suppose this is the best anyone can find. Rumi himself it seems wrote rather simply so I don't think the meaning, in general, is lost. It may be more difficult to fully understand but as for the translation, in terms of how accurate a translation of such text to another completely different language can be at best, is very good.

Great Book

The best translation is still the Reynold N. Nicholson. Maybe one day they'll reprint it.

Admittedly, there are few English translations of Book 2 of the Masnavi and you always loose something in translation. That said, I read an Alan Williams translation of Masnavi Book 1 that I loved --- Williams' maintained the musicality of the language and the endnotes were wonderful. In contrast, for me, this translation tries to create a rhyming structure in English, which frequently results in confusing language and a loss of the beauty of the language. I also found the end notes to be fairly unhelpful because they didn't provide sufficient context. But it's not a terrible translation ... I just regret not purchasing the more expensive Williams' translation of book 2.