The Essential Rumi, New Expanded Edition

Rumi (1207–1273) is the foremost Sufi poet, famous for his lyrics and for his didactic epic Masnavi, a collection of mystical tales and discourse. Rumi lived in the Seldjuk capital Konya, and his influence on literature, carried by his Sufism, spread with the expansion of the Ottoman Empire and lasted centuries.

Coleman Barks is an American poet. Although he neither speaks nor reads Persian, he is nonetheless renowned as an interpreter of Rumi and other mystic poets of Persia.

John Moyne is a Persian scholar, emeritus professor, and former head of the Linguistics Program at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.

Arthur John Arberry (1905–1969), as Head of the Department of Classics at Cairo University, acquired a firsthand knowledge of literary and social conditions in the Islamic Middle East. Between 1947 and 1969 he served as Sir Thomas Adams Professor of Arabic at Cambridge University. Professor Arberry published some twenty books in Islamic studies during his lifetime, many dealing with mysticism and poetry.

Reynold Nicholson (1868–1945) was Sir Thomas Adams Professor of Arabic at the University of Cambridge, and a distinguished editor and translator.

Robertson Dean has recorded hundreds of audiobooks in most every genre. He's been nominated for several Audie Awards, won eight Earphones Awards, and was named one of AudioFile magazine's Best Voices of 2010. He lives in Los Angeles, where he records books and acts in film, TV, and (especially) on stage.