A Mirrored Life has been the surprise of the season for me. Glancing at the name on the spine of the book, unknown to me, it was nothing but curiosity which made me pick up the novel from a stack ...

An 807-year-old Persian mystic and dervish, Rumi, has a massive following in the US and around the world. Jane Ciabattari explains his enduring influence.

Since then, he has published more than a dozen Rumi books. In our conversation, Barks described Rumi’s poetry as “the mystery of opening the heart,” a thing that, he told me, “you can’t ...