While chaitanya's practice has become a global movement over the last five hundred years, little is generally known about this spiritual reformer, as the two principal texts recounting his life were written in Bengali in the sixteenth century. In The Birth of Kirtan, bhakti scholar and teacher Ranchor prime adapts these two narratives into a moving and emotionally charged english-language biography for a modern audience. his poetic retelling is complemented by full-color reproductions of never-before-published nineteenth-century paintings of chaitanya's life.