René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke (1875–1926)—better known as Rainer Maria Rilke—was a Bohemian-Austrian poet and novelist, “widely recognized as one of the most lyrically intense German-language poets”, writing in both verse and highly lyrical prose. Several critics have described Rilke’s work as inherently “mystical”. His writings include one novel, several collections of poetry, and several volumes of correspondence in which he invokes haunting images that focus on the difficulty of communion with the ineffable in an age of disbelief, solitude, and profound anxiety. These deeply existential themes tend to position him as a transitional figure between the traditional and the modernist writers.
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I live my life in widening circles that reach out across the world.
—Rainer Maria Rilke
And even if you were in some prison, the walls of which let none of the sounds of the world come to your senses – would you not then still have your childhood, that precious, kingly possession, that treasure-house of memories?
—Rainer Maria Rilke
Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depth of your heart; confess to yourself you would have to die if you were forbidden to write.
—Rainer Maria Rilke
Topics: Writing
For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror which we are barely able to endure, and it amazes us so, because it serenely disdains to destroy us.
—Rainer Maria Rilke
Do not assume that he who seeks to comfort you now,|lives untroubled among the simple and quiet words|that sometimes do you good. His life may also have|much sadness and difficulty, that remains far beyond yours.|Were it otherwise, he would never have been able to find these words.
—Rainer Maria Rilke
Take your well-disciplined strengths, stretch them between the two great opposing poles, because inside human beings is where God learns.
—Rainer Maria Rilke
We see the brightness of a new page where everything yet can happen.
—Rainer Maria Rilke
Topics: Opportunity
A billion stars go spinning through the night, blazing high above you head. But in you is the presence that will be, when the stars are dead.
—Rainer Maria Rilke
This is the miracle that happens
every time to those who really love;
the more they give, the more they possess.
—Rainer Maria Rilke
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