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4.22 AVERAGE
4.22 AVERAGE
Can I just say that this book enlighten me just when I needed the most?
Solitude should not be feared, it should be embraced.
Solitude should not be feared, it should be embraced.
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
challenging
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
hopeful
People have been dealing with the same shit since forever, haven’t they? These thoughts were thought by someone are over a hundred years ago, at the start of another century, and yet they hold so much truth for us - for me - today. So many similar questions, so many similar tries at answers about what it means to be human. And all beautifully written and wrought into sentences that resonate.
(This requires separating the artists political views from the art though.)
(This requires separating the artists political views from the art though.)
4.5 for sure!
my edition of it included letters from a young poet and that part felt unnecessary so that’s why i am taking 0.5 off
but what an absolutely brilliant author and teacher. the letters were set out around this time more than 100 years ago so I felt I was reading a personal letter to myself around this time. def helped during the holiday season
would come back to it
my edition of it included letters from a young poet and that part felt unnecessary so that’s why i am taking 0.5 off
but what an absolutely brilliant author and teacher. the letters were set out around this time more than 100 years ago so I felt I was reading a personal letter to myself around this time. def helped during the holiday season
would come back to it
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
reflective
slow-paced
Dear Mr Rilke,
How can I thank you enough for these marvelously heartfelt letters, full of inspiration, beauty and wisdom. They are a glorious gift, a gospel of wonderful words which I will follow all the days of my life.
Dear Reader,
If there is one thing I would say to you, it is to caution you against immoderation, against lavish and excessive language. When you write, try to say what you really feel and using the simplest language you know. Listen to the silence deep in your heart and begin there. Then, as if no one had ever tried before, try to say what you see and feel and love and lose.
Dear Mr Rilke,
I am trying to keep your advice in mind but my heart is a busy, noisy, chattering place and it tells me to use five words instead of one, and long sentences rather than short ones.
Dear Reader,
Don't let yourself be controlled by irony, especially during uncreative moments. When you are fully creative, try to use it, as one more way to take hold of life. Search into the depths of things. Imagine yourself in some prison, whose walls let in none of the world’s sounds; for the writer or poet, solitude and silence are essential. And books. Read, read, read and then you will be able to write.
Dear Mr Rilke,
I do read, a wide selection of authors and titles, but sometimes I doubt my own judgement of what I read, especially when it differs from others or from the literary critics.
Dear Reader,
Read as little as possible of literary criticism; such things are either artisan opinions or else clever word-games. Works of art are of an infinite solitude; and no means of approach is so useless as criticism.
Dear Mr Rilke,
My dilemma when I read is an inability to abandon the work to its own solitude at the end, I always want to enter into dialogue with the writer.
Dear Reader,
Dialogue is good. Anything which gives rise to creativity is useful, words on a page or the blank page itself.
Dear Mr Rilke,
Speaking of blank pages, I felt an absence in your book. I wondered about the letters from Mr Kappus to which yours were a response?
Dear Reader,
It is the reader’s response which is important, not that of Mr Kappus, and since it was he who edited this book, we must presume he preferred to remain silent.
Dear Mr Rilke,
Had I the editing of this book, each letter would have been accompanied by a blank page, and exactly for that reason, for the reader’s response. That is how I would like all books to be, printed on one side of the page only so that the reader can fill in the other and have a real dialogue with the writer.
Dear Reader,
This is the best idea you have given me so far, and as for the rest, let life happen to you. Believe me: life is right, always.
challenging
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced