Tangled Braid: 99 poems by Hafiz of Shiraz

The Tangled Braid offers a fresh translation of one of the supreme spiritual poets – Hafiz of Shiraz. A unique collaboration between a Cistercian monk (John Slater) and an Islamic scholar (Jeffrey Einboden), this volume combines precision and, voicing Hafiz’ esoteric verses through powerful English lines.

As suggested by its title, The Tangled Braid interweaves a variety of discrete literary strands, knitting together spiritual meaning and sensual image; Muslim source and Western reader; classical Persian verse and modern English poetics. This translation aims to wed aesthetics and erudition, presenting a work of pleasure that is also intellectually enriching and spiritually invigorating.

Generated through conversation and exchange, these poetic translations provide an authentic means of crossing religious and cultural borders, admitting contemporary audiences into the illimitable world of Persian Sufism.

Translations of Sufi poetry in the West continue to attract wide, diverse readerships. In 2002, Time magazine recognized Coleman Barks’ The Essential Rumi to be ‘easily the most successful poetry book published in the West in the past decade’.