This chapter is divided into two sections. The first examines the growing cultural prominence of the thirteenth-century Sufi mystic Jalaluddin Rumi, whose poetry has achieved unprecedented global recognition across scholarly, popular and devotional spheres. Rumi’s influence has extended beyond literature into multimedia forms, inspiring music, film, dance and digital art. As Bruce Miller notes in Rumi Comes to America, Rumi has become a pop-cultural icon, commodified in Western consumer culture and marketed as a symbol of “alternative Islam”—one seen as peaceful, mystical and detached from political extremism. This section explores how Rumi’s Western popularity has been shaped by processes of domestication, appropriation and Americanisation, positioning him as a counter-narrative to dominant Islamophobic discourses. The second section focuses on the number of fictionalised biographies of Rumi that have emerged since 1998, including novels by Elif Shafak, Nigel Watts, Roger Housden, Muriel Maufroy, Connie Zweig, Nahal Tajadod, Ahmet Ümit and Rabi Sankar Bal. These texts reimagine Rumi’s life and teachings—particularly his emphasis on love, spiritual transformation and interfaith tolerance—as a response to post-9/11 anxieties. The chapter critically analyses how these works contribute to the global visibility of Rumi while promoting a version of Sufism framed as a compassionate alternative to religious extremism.