book series

This discussion group will follow 5 books over 5 months running from January to May. The meeting for each book will take place the nal Thursday of that month. This group is open to anyone and you dont have to do all 5 books to participate. You may come and go as you please. You will also receive a free copy of each book you choose to participate in!

book series (cont.)

april
Leo Africanus By Amin Maalouf Translated by Peter Sluglett
meet: thurs, april 24 | 6pm

lecture series
A two-part lecture series Mecca & Medina: The Historical & Future Heart of Islam, led by Dr. Lawry de Bivort, with original photos and video from Mecca and Medina. The two largest public works projects in the world are taking place now in Mecca and Medina, the renovation and huge expansion of the fabled Two Mosques, an extraordinary armation of the world-wide future of Islam. Join us to learn about the historical and contemporary signicance of these two cultural hubs of the Islamic world.

j a n u ary
When Asia Was the World: Traveling Merchants, Scholars, Warriors, and Monks Who Created the Riches of the East By Stewart Gordon
meet: thurs, jan 30 | 6pm

may
In An Antique Lane By Amitav Ghos
meet: thurs, may 29 | 6pm

m a r c h 5 & 1 2 | 6 pm in the program room

sufi mystic poets series

f e b r u ary
The House of Wisdom: How Arabic Science Saved Ancient Knowledge and Gave Us the Renaissance By Jim Al-Khalili
meet: thurs, feb 27 | 6pm

film series
muh ammad:
Legacy of a Prophet Directed by Alexander Kronemer, Michael Wolfe & Michael Schwarz
wed, jan 14 | 6pm

ma rch
The Ornament of the World By Maria Rosa Menocal
meet: thurs, march 27 | 6pm

For three Thursdays in May, join local poet and scholar Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer for a three-part series, Where Poetry Meets the Divine: Su Mystics and the State of Your Life. The three poets being studied are Rumi, Haz and Rabia. Though Trommer has led discussions on these same three mystics in the past, this time she will oer new poems and new translators not used in previous classes. This is ecstatic poetry, with its words rooted in the human need for companionship and a longing to connect with the divine. In their poems, we see ourselves and our culture, despite the fact that they are writing to us over centuries and across cultural boundaries. This is poetry to laugh to, to cry with, to memorize and carry with us as we move through the day.Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

ins ide t he koran:

A Journey Into The Heart of Islam Directed by Anthony Thomas
wed, jan 21 | 6pm

koran by h eart : please sign up at thelibrary front desk.

One Chance to Remember Directed by Greg Barker
wed, jan 28 | 6pm

m a r c h 1 , 8 & 1 5 | 6 pm in the telluride room

about muslim journeys

The Muslim Journeys project presents to the American public resources representing diverse perspectives on the people, places, histories, beliefs, practices, and cultures of Muslims in the United States and around the world. Centuries before the dawn of the modern ageeven before the voyages of Christopher Columbus and Ferdinand Magellanthe world was already a surprisingly interconnected place. Braving the high seas and the desert sands, merchants peddled their wares from the Mediterranean to China. Scientists and scholars, drawn to the far corners of the world by a thirst for knowledge, traveled just as far, searching out their peers and sharing the latest ideas about the mysteries of nature. And missionaries and holy men, as they spread the good word of their respective faiths, plied the same roadsinevitably meeting one another, debating the merits of their divergent creeds, and taking inspiration from each other as they pondered the meaning of life and the nature of the divine. All of the books in this list explore this theme of connected histories, a new way of understanding the past in which Islam and the West, far from being locked in an endless clash of civilizations, are seen instead as products of this cosmopolitan and inextricably intertwined history. By highlighting the intellectual inheritance shared by Islam and the West, their mutual bonds of monotheism, and the surprising intensity of their cultural and commercial interaction, as well as the individual experiences of the many merchants, missionaries, and other adventurers who journeyed to the other shore, these books all chart a path to a new vision of the world of our ancestors, a world that was as remarkably complex and dynamically interconnected as the one we live in today.

film, book, lecture & poetry series

wilkinson public library