#178: Haleh Liza Gafori — Rumi’s Wisdom for Modern Life, The Craft of Translation, Poetry as Liberation

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Jan 25, 2026

Haleh Liza Gafori, translator, performance artist and educator known for her Rumi translations, discusses bringing music and fidelity to old texts. She talks about trusting sound and rhythm, why she began translating Rumi, and tests for whether a translation works. Conversations touch on Rumi’s teachings about attention, love as discipline, reconciling tough histories, and how translation shapes craft.

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ANECDOTE

First Memory That Sparked A Life's Work

Haleh first remembers her father reciting a Rumi poem whose rhythm stayed with her even before she understood the meaning.
That childhood memory later motivated her to translate that same poem for her book Gold.

INSIGHT

Mind-Forged Manacles And Liberation

Rumi frames liberation as bursting the mind-forged manacles that imprison us.
Haleh links this Sufi concern to human liberation and the ecstatic moments his practice produced.

ANECDOTE

A Wrong Line That Started It All

Haleh began translating Rumi when a published line on her desk didn't match the original Persian.
Correcting that line pulled her into translation as a creative, puzzle-solving practice.

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Translator, performance artist, writer, and educator Haleh Liza Gafori on translating Rumi with fidelity and music, and what his poetry can teach us about liberation, attention, and love.

You’ll learn:

Habits Haleh uses to re-centre and get quiet enough to work.
How she learned to trust sound and rhythm first, and let meaning arrive through the ear.
The moment she realised she needed to make her own translations, and what triggered that decision.
A simple test for “is this translation working?”, including why one wrong image can flip the whole poem.
Principles Haleh uses to keep translations clear, musical, and emotionally true in English.
What an editor can mean by “find your voice,” and how to develop a consistent voice as a translator.
How to work with old texts honestly, including naming what doesn’t align with your ethics today.
What Rumi can teach modern readers about attention, ego, and compassion in daily life.
How love shows up in Rumi as a discipline, not a vibe, and why that matters in hard times.
What Haleh is building next, and how teaching can deepen (not dilute) your creative practice.

Resources & Links

About Haleh Liza Gafori:

Haleh Liza Gafori is a New York City-born translator, performance artist, writer, and educator of Persian descent. A 2024 MacDowell fellow, she has translated the poetry of the Persian mystic and sage Rumi. Her book of translations, Gold: Poems by Rumi, was published by New York Review Books in 2022. Her second volume of translations, Water: Poems by Rumi, was released in 2025, also by NYRB Classics. Supported by an NYSCA grant, Gafori has created a musical and cross-media performance based on the book, and has presented her work through performances, lectures, and workshops at institutions such as Lincoln Center, Stanford University, the Academy of American Poets, and Sarah Lawrence College. Her book of translations Gold has been incorporated into curricula at universities across the country.

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