What a great posting - so many intriguing things to follow…
Also of interest is the Diane de Selliers illustrated edition of the Afkham Arbandi / Dick Davis translation of The Canticle of the Birds. Hard to find, and pricey, but invaluable for the introductory essays, especially the commentary of Michael Barry. Most wonderful of all is the array of art collected and integrated into the text by the editors. After several failed attempts to read Conference/Canticle of the Birds, this finally did the trick. It takes you into a world you never want to leave.
And in the Michael Barry vein, see also his Design and Color in Islamic Architecture. It is a stunning presentation of the Haft Paykar (Seven Beauties), and how traditional Islamic crafts draw on alchemical processes to illustrate the esoteric nature of all things “seven” in Sufism and Islam more generally. Back in the mid-90s (at latest) Barry, like Tom Cheetham, was very much onto Henry Corbin, who Barry invokes in this book, making his own brief translations from Corbin’s original French. Like the book above, this is a real achievement of world-creation, both literal and imaginal.
Tom, the Canticle is on eBay for 1300.00…still exorbitant, but better than 3000.00 (!) I was lucky enough to hear of it during pre-publication, and got it for 275.00…hard to believe the current prices. Also, the French de Selliers paperback edition (full-sized) is on AbeBooks for 75.00. It has all the glorious images, which can be correlated with the Dick Davis Penguin edition ($12 new). Happy Hunting! …and thanks for all your work here and elsewhere.
I just discovered that the entire de Selliers English version is available for free on Internet Archive. You have to open a free account, but you can read the entire book, with all essays, and all color images!
What a great posting - so many intriguing things to follow…
Also of interest is the Diane de Selliers illustrated edition of the Afkham Arbandi / Dick Davis translation of The Canticle of the Birds. Hard to find, and pricey, but invaluable for the introductory essays, especially the commentary of Michael Barry. Most wonderful of all is the array of art collected and integrated into the text by the editors. After several failed attempts to read Conference/Canticle of the Birds, this finally did the trick. It takes you into a world you never want to leave.
And in the Michael Barry vein, see also his Design and Color in Islamic Architecture. It is a stunning presentation of the Haft Paykar (Seven Beauties), and how traditional Islamic crafts draw on alchemical processes to illustrate the esoteric nature of all things “seven” in Sufism and Islam more generally. Back in the mid-90s (at latest) Barry, like Tom Cheetham, was very much onto Henry Corbin, who Barry invokes in this book, making his own brief translations from Corbin’s original French. Like the book above, this is a real achievement of world-creation, both literal and imaginal.
Gosh Lee, so much here… I would love to see that edition… $3000+ used… And I’ll see what I can find by Barry. Many thanks for all of this!
Tom, the Canticle is on eBay for 1300.00…still exorbitant, but better than 3000.00 (!) I was lucky enough to hear of it during pre-publication, and got it for 275.00…hard to believe the current prices. Also, the French de Selliers paperback edition (full-sized) is on AbeBooks for 75.00. It has all the glorious images, which can be correlated with the Dick Davis Penguin edition ($12 new). Happy Hunting! …and thanks for all your work here and elsewhere.
PS. https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=31795101502&ref_=ps_ggl_17738760402&cm_mmc=ggl-_-COM_Shopp_Rare-_-product_id=bi%3A%2031795101502-_-keyword=&gad_source=1&gbraid=0AAAAAD3Y6gs0ELZMIC9pyAYNFCRXfGaHZ&gclid=CjwKCAiAyJS7BhBiEiwAyS9uNfroFyhDuM1m886pVAs5znDWeF0kPhau-mypVrfxRRH--YBdPZ8MpRoCYAMQAvD_BwE
I just discovered that the entire de Selliers English version is available for free on Internet Archive. You have to open a free account, but you can read the entire book, with all essays, and all color images!
https://archive.org/details/canticleofbirdsi0000atta/page/12/mode/2up
OMG - brilliant!!!! Ha! Miracles do happen. Thank you for looking. I tried a couple other such sources but came up empty…
I will put this link in the archived version of the post!
Love your drawing! and wonder if it is something we ought to memorize or rather remember, in the body of all?
thanks … yeah body memory seems to right idea…