Chasing Rumi

by Housden, Roger

• ISBN13: 9780060084455
• ISBN10: 0060084456
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2002-09-19
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publications

Summary

This enchanting story, set in the late 1950s, takes us from the hills and piazzas of Florence to the green domed mosques of Konya, Turkey. Upon discovering a poem by the thirteenth-century Sufi dervish Rumi, Georgiou, a young Greek icon painter, is compelled to travel to the land that this poet called home. Inspired by Rumi's magical words, Georgiou leaves his father and their small business in hopes of recapturing the transcendent power of an early childhood vision. Through encounters with Christian and Islamic mystics, and guided by forces he cannot name, Georgiou gradually learns to follow his own heart. The closer he gets to Konya and to Rumi's tomb, the more in awe he becomes at the workings of fate. But it is only when Georgiou returns to Florence that his life changes forever in an experience that reveals the mystery of life and love. In the tradition of The Alchemist and Siddartha, Chasing Rumi is a spellbinding and enduring story for all.

Excerpts

Chasing Rumi
A Fable About Finding the Heart's True Desire

Chapter One

Georgiou ran lightly, two steps at a time, up the worn marble stairs that lead to the Museo San Marco in Florence. It was an afternoon of steady light in the summer of his eighteenth year. At the top of the stairs he paused for a moment, aware suddenly of that museum flavor—the high, arched ceilings, the faint odor of polish from a dark wooden floor, the cool touch of the handrail, a brass one, that accompanied the stairs. The museum had once been a monastery, and in the fifteenth century Fra Angelico, the great Renaissance painter, had been a monk there. One of his duties had been to adorn each of the monks’ cells with a fresco.

When Georgiou turned to face the entrance to the monks’ dormitory, his eyes met the glow of a delicate radiance. Through the open archway, like an apparition, The Annunciation, Fra Angelico’s masterpiece, shone down on him from a large stone wall. In seconds, his natural exuberance gave way to a mood more sober and thoughtful. Something in the flowing grace of the angel Gabriel’s robe—or perhaps it was the reverence the angel and the Virgin showed in inclining toward each other—checked his youthful step and drew his attention inward.

A few moments there at the top of the stairs, and he started along the corridor, moving slowly now. He peered round the first couple of arched doors into the small, whitewashed rooms, pausing briefly to take in the frescoes that the master had painted for the monks’ contemplation. When he came to the next door, he stepped inside the cell.

There, painted directly onto the dry surface of the wall, was the fresco depicting the Sermon on the Mount. The disciples were gathered in contemplation round Jesus. He was sitting a little above them on a stylized rock washed in a soft yellow that glowed on the wall of the cell. Christ’s right arm was raised, his forefinger pointing to heaven.

Georgiou stood in front of the painting entranced—by the luminous tones, lavender and green, of the disciples’ robes, the remarkable simplicity of the drawing, but above all by the look on the faces of the disciples. They were filled with a rapture he had never known existed; a tangible sweetness of love, which was both of this world and not of it at the same time. Their expression seemed to show a love for Jesus, the man, and also for something else that could never be put into words. His legs began to tremble, his back turned cold.

The thoughts in Georgiou’s mind ebbed away. Unable to take his eyes from those beautiful faces, he fell into a deep silence. His strength failed him, and he sank slowly to the floor. How long he sat there, lost in the masterpiece, he had no idea. When he finally got to his feet he knew, though not with his ordinary mind, that he had been filled with the love that makes the world.Chasing Rumi
A Fable About Finding the Heart's True Desire. Copyright © by Roger Housden. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold.

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Excerpted from Chasing Rumi: A Fable about Finding the Heart's True Desire by Roger Housden
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.