The Prophet

Kahlil Gibran (1883-1931), an artist, poet, and writer, was born in Lebanon and spent much of his productive life in the United States. He is known in the English-speaking world primarily for The Prophet, a book of twenty-six poetic essays published in 1923 which achieved cult status. He remains one of the world's bestselling poets, second only to Shakespeare and Lao-Tzu. To many he is a genius whose philosophical and prophetic style convey important messages about life and humanity in a simple, yet beautifully eloquent manner, which was described by Library Journal as poetic prose, half New Testament, and half Walt Whitman."