Dick Davis' "The Conference of the Birds": A Classic Persian Poem Explored

Ingdur: I lost this book while moving, and had somewhat forgotten about it, when I saw a Youtube from Let's talk religion, and ordered it again. Only minus is the small print. the translation of this version is much better than the one I remember, because it is poetical. The old one was just plain text.

United States on Oct 11, 2023

reviewer: I enjoyed this book very much.

United States on Sep 06, 2023

Sindhu: Only true seekers can understand

India on Jul 15, 2023

Hanane: Very enlightening and spiritual. Translation is most likely the best version available, though it’s not perfect as some of the meaning is lost.

United States on Jul 10, 2023

Canadian Gal: I have been in a book reading slump lately, not really finding anything that grabs me, this grabbed me and pulled me in right from the start. Beautiful, spiritual read, recommend for anyone who wants to lift their spirits.

Canada on Jul 04, 2023

Hamid: Probably the best translation out there. But unfortunately the magic is lost in translation no matter how good it may be. Islam has given so much to this world from Mathematics to Art. I am glad to see people coming to realize this in the age of information.

Canada on Jan 19, 2023

Ian Thumwood: I picked up this book after ending a 40-odd year quest to see a Hoopoe whilst on holiday in Qatar and being informed that there was a famous Islamic book where this bird was the central character. Whilst I was aware of this book, I had not made the connection with the Hoopoe and became really interested in reading it.

Attar was a 12th century Sufi poet from Persia but , having been an enthusiastic reader of European, medieval literature in the 1990s, I would have to say was far more sophisticated than his Western contemporaries. The opening introduction to the poem is a hard read yet when Attar starts the main body of his work, it is surpringly easy to read. Many other versions of this poem omit this introduction as well as the epilogue and therefore this Penguin edition must be recommended as it is complete. I found the epilogue to be one of the highlights of the poem and maybe it's most "human" element and would not have wanted this to have been missed now that I am fully aware of the poem's form.

On the plus side, as a birdwatching it is nice that the writer had a good understanding of birds. The "difficult" element of this poem largely stems from the fact that I...

United Kingdom on Jan 12, 2023

VidKap: This book is basically a poem which is 260 pages long. Or perhaps you could call it a collection of poems which together tell a sequential story. Rather than focus on the theme of the poem, of which there are several reviews which are much better than what I would write here, I will just mention one or two things about this translation and edition.

1. This is complete - I first read not this translation but the one by Edward Fitzgerald, which is freely available on the net. That translation is incomplete and translates only some of the poems. It is possible that Fitzgerald translated the complete poem and I got my hands on an abridged version, but then I could not find a complete Fitzgerald translation despite several searches on the net. This translation by Afkham Darbandi and Dick Davis is complete and this book is several times larger than Fitzgerald book. In fact, this is the only complete translation I could find in verse form. If there are others out there, please do comment on this review so that others can also know of them. The Edward Fitzgerald translation can be found here...

India on May 10, 2015

Merrily Baird: Ask a well-educated Iranian for advice on reading the Persian classics and high on his/her list will likely be "The Conference of the Birds," a medieval poetic allegory written by Farid ud-Din Attar. Attar began his professional life as a well-educated pharmacist, and, after some years of listening to the cares and concerns of his patients, devoted himself instead to travel and the study of philosophy. These travels, which extended throughout the Middle East, Turkistan, and India, left him most profoundly impressed by the Sufi approach to Islam and culminated in the writing of "The Conference of the Birds." This lengthy verse poem tells of the search of the world's birds for a magical leader, symbolizing the quest of the human soul for unity with the Supreme Being.

Precisely who among the Sufi philosophers and authors of his age most influenced Attar is not well documented, but there is no doubt of the the impact he in turn would have on the work of Rumi and Hafez, the Sufi poets today best known in the West. To further round out your appreciation of the impact that Attar's classic has had over the centuries, treat yourself to the recently published "The Canticle of the...

United States on Mar 09, 2015

Bookworm: Farid ud-Din Attar, also known as Attar of Nishapur, a Persian poet, was born in Nishapur, Iran in 1145. In his early career as a pharmacist, he helped many people in his home town. Later he abandoned his pharmacy and traveling to different countries became his intense interest. After meeting some Sufi leaders in India, he started promoting Sufi ideas as he returned to Nishapur. Attar's master piece, "The Conference of the Birds", is a poetic moral story of a flock of birds in the journey of seeking truth, the God. With aimless life style, birds around the world gather in a garden try to find out if there is a meaning in life and if there is a God. An intelligent bird, called hoopoe, led these birds and started their long journey of searching for truth, the meaning of existence. By using riddles and answers, hoopoe advised and encouraged all birds to be brave, grateful and to be truthful. Life is not an easy game and we all live to be reborn and we are born to learn how to live a fulfilling life.

Translated by Afkham Darbandi(Davis's wife) and Dr. Dick Davis, this exceptional book catches man's heart for almost one thousand years. If you like Rumi and Hafez, you will enjoy...

United States on Dec 04, 2010