Gibran Kahlil Gibran (1883–1931), usually referred to in English as Kahlil Gibran, was a Lebanese American writer, poet and artist. Though many consider him a philosopher, Gibran himself rejected that label. He is most widely recognized as the author of The Prophet, one of the most translated and bestselling books of all time.

Born in the village of Mount Lebanon Mutasarrifate, Gibran immigrated to the United States with his mother and siblings in 1895. By 1911 he was settled in New York and had made a name for himself within the city’s artistic and writing community. While most of his early writings were in Arabic, he began publishing his work in English in 1918, beginning with The Madman, and continued to write in English throughout the rest of his life.

Reproduced here is an early English draft of Gibran’s The Prophet, which was published by Alfred A. Knopf in New York City in 1923. The book, also published in Arabic in Cairo at the same time, is a collection of 26 prose poetry fables. Telling the story of a prophet named Al Mustafa, the work is divided into chapters dealing with topics such as family and marriage, crime and punishment, and reason and passion. Readers and literary critics have drawn parallels to the theological topics in the work of William Blake, Walt Whitman and Ralph Waldo Emerson. Aside from these Western writers, recognized themes of influence in The Prophet include Arabic art, European classicists like Leonardo da Vinci and more modern surrealist symbolism.

Though initial reception to the work was cool, its popularity grew markedly in the 1960s when it was picked up on by the American counterculture and emerging New Age movement. Popular artists like Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash proudly owned copies and made reference to the work in their own lives and music.

Since its publication in 1923, The Prophet has gone on to be translated into more than 100 languages and has never been out of print. The handwritten draft we have reproduced here comes from the holdings of the Princeton University Library’s Special Collections, Manuscripts Division. We are honoured to add this monumental work to our Embellished Manuscripts Collection.