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Eva de Vitray Meyerovitch – A Woman’s Path to the Heart of Islam
Eva de Vitray Meyerovitch
Katharine Branning
Cathryn Goddard
$24.95
NOW AVAILABLE – FONS VITAE RUMI SERIES The renowned scholar and preeminent translator of Rumi, Eva de Vitray Meyerovitch (1909-1999) was educated by nuns and went on to study Christian theology at the Sorbonne, taking degrees in law and ancient Greek philosophy. Yet a chance reading of Rumi inspired her to learn Persian in order to translate and make his works available for the French-speaking world.
This dedication became her life’s work. Her profound understanding of Rumi—which only a translator can truly attain—made it possible for her to bridge the two cultures in which she comfortably lived—modern day France and the 13th century Turkey of Rumi as well as the Islamic world today.
These interviews take us on a breathtaking journey of faith, introducing us along the way to a wide range of thinkers—such as her extraordinary mentor Louis Massignon, and the rector of Cairo’s Azhar University where she taught, as well as anecdotes involving her numerous personal friendships and professional encounters. Her moving, challenging, noble and often humorous story highlights the beauty that comes from a life of faith lived through the lens of her spiritual master Rumi.
Interviews by Rachel and Jean-Pierre Cartier with Eva de Vitray-Meyerovitch
Translated by Cathryn Goddard. An English translation of Islam, l’autre visage. Albin Michel: Espaces libres, Paris 1995, first published by Criterion, 1991
With heartfelt thanks to the editor Katharine Branning and to the proofreader Anne Ogden.
REVIEW: Eva de Vitray-Meyerovitch, A Woman’s Path to the Heart of Islam. Interviews by Rachel and Jean-Pierre Cartier. Translated by Cathryn Goddard, Louisville, Fons Vitae, « Rumi Series », 2020, 168 p.
Should you have known Eva de Vitray-Meyerovitch or not, this book immerses the reader into the intimate space of spiritual itinerary. Rachel and Jean-Pierre Cartier have had the initiative of collecting a testimony of the singular life of Eva de Vitray-Meyerovitch (1909-1999). This initiative has been immortalized by the publication of this interview in 1991, then reedited and translated in several languages up to now. Today it’s time for it to be translated in English. The language was familiar to Eva de Vitray-Meyerovitch, which was transmitted to her by her maternal grandmother Mary Theodora Wood. This work is the result of a quite particular initiative, as according to the translator Cathryn Goddard, it is the author herself who pushed her to translate the interview.
The format given to it combines a dynamic with a pleasant access to the text for the reader : it has taken the shape of a discussion one could have in an intimate relationship. Intimacy is the topic here. This aspect of the author’s life is rarely developed in her immense work, this is surely why she didn’t particularly like the book. Surprising for someone who didn’t like talking about herself, isn’t it ? The particularity of her testimony is that she plunges us into a long, deep story which crosses ages and civilizations. This story is her own but it opens onto worlds, by making us discover how an intellectual Frenchwoman of the XXth century, a witness to her own time and to her personal-commitment, questions herself about the quest of the soul, how she discovers and understands it, across different horizons. God is transcendant and immanent to us. The author delivers the way she lived this relation to the Divine, according to different traditions. In the first part of her life, it is referring to Roman Catholicism, then to Sunni Islam and Sufism in the second half of it.
This testimony shows us the highly intemporal quality of Muhammad Iqbal’s mind and of Djalâl ud-Dîn Rûmî’s teaching. In this work, the author talks of the striking elements of her life : her memories of childhood, the trials she encountered in life, her questions about existence, the impact of her literary and philosophical discoveries, her spiritual experiences and her way of living the sacred and conceiving it.
The title is true to the author’s thinking and to the teaching of cheikh Khaled Bentounes, putting Sufism at the heart of the Qoranic universe. The chosen illustrations allow us to visualise the testimony of the author’s life by means of carefully selected historical records. Finally, the cheikh Khaled Bentounes’ foreword, and the words of Cathryn Goddard, as those of Esin Çelebi and of Virginia Gray Henry in this edition, show us the author as a universal woman who built bridges between different worlds, and as quite singular, with a unique and endearing personality, to whom close relations stay true throughout time.
– Samir Abdelli
Samir Abdelli is a researcher in contemporary history, at the department of Languages & Civilizations at Bordeaux-Montaigne University. His research thesis is on the life of Eva de Vitray-Meyerovitch. It is entitled: “For a historical approach to the life of Eva de Vitray-Meyerovitch (1909-1999). A singular trajectory between science and spirituality,” under the direction of Mehdi Ghouirgate.
Reviews
This book is the best testimony on the life of Eva, her personality, her thought. It also renders her deep connection with Rumi, of which she was one of the main translators.
[A] discussion one could have in an intimate relationship. Intimacy is the topic here. ... she plunges us into a long, deep story which crosses ages and civilizations. This story is her own but it opens onto worlds, by making us discover how an intellectual Frenchwoman of the XXth century, a witness to her own time and to her personal-commitment, questions herself about the quest of the soul, how she discovers and understands it, across different horizons.
God is transcendant and immanent to us. The author delivers the way she lived this relation to the Divine, according to different traditions. In the first part of her life, it is referring to Roman Catholicism, then to Sunni Islam and Sufism in the second half of it.
