While pithy and accessible, the book easily stands up to academic scrutiny, and includes the original Tibetan as well—making it ideal for the popular, scholarly, and Tibetan audiences all at once.

Praise & Reviews “A lively commentary [on] a poetic classic of Buddhist literature. Editor Michele Martin has supplemented Thrangu Rinpoche's lucid commentary with notes and appendices that make the book as accessible for novices as it is rewarding for experienced practitioners and scholars.”—Buddhadharma "I found A Song for the King a very helpful book for my own practice. It's a clear and profound presentation of Mahamudra."—Melvin McLeod, Editor in Chief of Buddhadharma: The Practitioner's Journal, and Shambhala Sun “A Song for the King is the most important work in a generation about the pithiest and deepest of Saraha’s great trilogy of Indian Buddhist tantric songs. Michele Martin’s translation and annotations are lucid and well informed, and Thrangu Rinpoche’s learned but accessible commentary allows readers to use Saraha’s poem as key to seeing, meditating, and acting in the profound Indo-Tibetan tradition of mahamudra, the great seal of reality.” —Roger Jackson, author of Tantric Treasures: Three Collections of Mystical Verse from Buddhist India and Professor of Religion at Carleton College ”Saraha’s Song for the King is a sublime ode to enlightenment, famous in Tibet for nearly a millennium. Traditionally counted as one in a trilogy of poetic songs offered by Saraha to the king, queen, and people of eastern India, A Song for the King uses a series of linked metaphors to lead the listener through the stages of mahamudra meditation. The oral teaching on Saraha’s Songby contemporary master Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche, so smoothly translated here by Peter O’Hearn, is based upon a famous sixteenth-century commentary by Karma Trinlépa. Thrangu Rinpoche’s careful analysis helps the reader to savor both the aesthetic richness and the contemplative instructions of Saraha’s verses. This eloquent work is a welcome contribution to the literature on Saraha’s songs in English.” —Kurtis R. Schaeffer, author of Dreaming the Great Brahmin: Tibetan Traditions of the Buddhist Poet-Saint Saraha. and Professor of Tibetan Buddhism at the University of Virginia "Saraha was one of the 84 masters of India and he lived, most probably, in ninth-century Bengal. Tradition has it that he was the first to introduce mahamudra as the central practice of meditation. A very accessible and powerful form of meditation, it has been popular with Westerners since it was recommended in the 1970s by the Sixteenth Karmapa. This edition, by the tutor of the Seventeenth Karmapa, brings the classical Indian text to life."—Mandala

Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche, Author Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche is a senior scholar within the Kagyu tradition of Tibetan Buddhism and the author of many books and commentaries. He was born in Kham, Tibet, in 1933 and entered Thrangu Monastery at age seven. He serves as the main tutor to His Holiness the Seventeenth Karmapa and travels worldwide giving teachings and leading retreats. Based in Nepal and India, he is also abbot of Gampo Abbey in Nova Scotia and founder of Vajra Vidya Retreat Center in Crestone, Colorado. Michele Martin, Editor Michele Martin has been a Buddhist practitioner for over thirty years. After receiving graduate degrees from Yale, she studied in Japan, India, and Nepal with numerous masters of meditation and scholars, while also serving as an oral translator and editing many volumes on Buddhism. Her publications include Music in the Sky: The Life Art, and Teachings of the 17th Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje and numerous translations from Tibetan texts on philosophy and meditation. She lives in the Catskill Mountains of upstate New York.