photo by Rick Romancito

from the Taos News, February 8, 2007 Taos, New Mexico, USA IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF THE MYSTIC Mirabai Starr translates Teresa of Ávila’s autobiography for an eager new audience by Virginia L. Clark

A very special event is taking place Saturday (Feb. 10, 2007), the book launch for “Teresa of Ávila: The Book of My Life” (2007, Shambhala Publications, Boston, Mass., $26.95 hardcover) translated by Taos daughter Mirabai Starr. An adjunct professor of philosophy and religious studies at the University of New Mexico-Taos, Starr is also the product of a Taos and Lama Foundation upbringing.

In her translation of “ The Interior Castle” (2003), Starr captured the Spanish mystic’s inde-pendent, even proto feminist, spirit in Teresa’s inspired text about the soul’s journey to the state of enlightenment within.

“ The fact that she was an activist is what also made her a saint,” Starr said in an interview at her Taos home. “She was completely, unapolo-getically herself, and that’s what makes her a saint. She was courageous and spoke truth to power.”

Starr was the first translator outside the Catholic Church to present the female saint’s epic treatise on balancing the inner and outer life, and she has been praised for making what had been dry and convoluted, suddenly new and accessible. She accomplishes the same feat with the saint’s autobiography.

“Mirabai Starr’s translation of Saint Teresa’s autobiography is a work for our time,” said Car-oline Myss, author of “Anatomy of the Spirit.”

“She has given Teresa a presence and a voice in a modern era ... this translation is pure genius.”

With this newest release, Starr dives into the very heart of Saint Teresa’s worldwide popularity by giving us this autobiography of “the wretched worm,” a term many people find regrettable, but which, among other things, Saint Teresa used to describe herself and the soul’s progress; comparing the arduous process to the meta-morphosis of a silk worm into a butterfly.

Both translations are excellent additions to the lexicon of Teresa of Ávila (1515 1582), who easily rivals Saint Fran-cis of Assisi in the affections of Catholics and non-Catholics the world over. Starr is also the translator of “ The Dark Night of the Soul” by Saint John of the Cross, Teresa’s confidant, protégé and fellow reformer of Spanish Catholicism.

Interestingly, Starr is the first woman to have translated Teresa’s “Life” into English. “Frankly, I’m amazed more women haven’t translated Teresa of Ávila,” Starr told the Library Journal.

“She has so much to say to women across cultures and throughout the centuries: How could we not have claimed her as our own? And yet, her message transcends gender. She speaks to anyone on a serious spiritual path — anyone who is looking for a deeper experi-ence than the kind of feel-good spirituality being marketed by pop culture.

I am approaching this work as a woman, using a woman’s voice to speak a woman’s heart. And because I am not a Catholic, or even a Christian, I find that I am able to both connect with and con-vey something essential about Teresa’s humanity that might not be as evident in the more literal and more orthodox versions previously offered by men.”

Starr has studied a wide variety of religious traditions, including Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity. Raised by secular Jewish parents who believed that organized religion was responsible for most of the ills in the world, Starr nonetheless broke with her parents’ secularity when she went to live at the Lama Foundation above San Cristòbal, located in the mountains between Taos and Questa.

A little like her subject, Starr said she, too, had transcendental experiences as a child and they scared her, but they probably ignited her own passion for the sacred. Like Teresa entering the convent against her father’s wishes, “it took a lot for me to learn to walk my path in the face of (her parents’) resistance.”

As much as she craves the sacred, Starr said she also loves writers and languages, which is also why expressions of the “ineffable” by mystics are so addicting.

Defining a mystic as someone who has direct experience of the divine encounter with true love, she finds the paradox of writing about the inexpressible irresistible.

“Why is it that mystics claim that mystical experience transcends language and concept, and yet they are compelled to write the most glorious literature in the world,” she said, giving as examples the Sufi poets, such as Rumi, the German writer Rainer Maria Rilke and “Song of Psalms” from the Old Testament of the Bible. It was because of her UNM-Taos classes that she first decided to translate John of the Cross’ “Dark Night of the Soul.”

“The language was so cumber-some, and it was the one book I most loved,” she said about “Dark Night of the Soul.” “ That book speaks to my essential understanding that sacred-ness lies in emptiness and stillness. It’s not about form. It’s about stillness.”

In making these books accessible for today’s reader, Starr has taken some license with the use of certain words grounded in orthodox theology, something that has drawn some negative criticism. “I do search for more inclusive language,” she said in the Library Journal interview.

“For instance, instead of the word ‘sin,’ I use the original Hebrew translation, ‘missing the mark’ or ‘error.’ In place of a personified ‘devil,’ I use ‘the spirit of evil.’ Mainstream critical reviews have been uniformly positive. Many Catholics have expressed gratitude that I have made their own saints more available to them by making their teachings more flowing and accessible. Nonreligious readers seem to appreciate the perennial wisdom Teresa and John have to offer, a wisdom as relevant and useful today as it was five centuries ago. Criticisms of the work tended to come from strict Christians who would prefer the familiar and more orthodox religious terminology.

These objections only serve to reinforce my sense that I am reaching a broader audience than the traditional readership already familiar with these great saints.”

The forward to the book is by Tessa Bielecki, former co-founder of the Carmelite Monastery in Crestone, Colo., who left after 40 years of monastic life. Bielecki and Starr connected after “ The Interior Castle” was published. “She’s the living embodiment of Teresa,” Starr said. “She’s earthy, practical, passionate and warm. I think she is like Saint Teresa. I’m much more like Saint John.”

Helping to launch Starr’s latest enterprise will be “ Writing Down the Bones” author Natalie Goldberg, who first introduced Starr to creative writing as a preteen back in 1970.

Bielecki also plans to be on hand, along with Sarah Jane Freyman, Starr’s New York agent whom she has never met in person, and Father William Hart McNichols, a close friend Starr credits with pushing her to do this latest trans-lation.

Starr said the book launch is a benefit for SOMOS, the local literary arts nonprofit organization, “because I so much believe in what SOMOS offers our community and they have been support-ive of me for so many years, since I was a young writer.”

She not only offers potent teachings on spiritual growth, but also practical advice on navigating the treacherous waters of human relationships. Her love of God is so passionate and poetic, one does not even need to be a believer in God to appreciate Teresa’s stunning intimacy with her invisible Beloved.”

Starr’s book is also available as an audio CD read by Bielecki and featuring music by Taos musician Jenny Bird for $29.95.

—Taos News
Tempo supplement
February 8, 2007
Taos, New Mexico, USA

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