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michaela_joy's review against another edition
3.0
overall i didn’t find this collection particularly touching, but the letters that were moving moved mountains.
my favorite lines:
“but death is so deeply rooted in the nature of love (if we only become cognizant of death without being misled by the ugliness and suspicions attached to it) that it nowhere contradicts love.”
“we wildly gather the honey of the visible, in order to store it in the great golden hive of the invisible.”
my favorite lines:
“but death is so deeply rooted in the nature of love (if we only become cognizant of death without being misled by the ugliness and suspicions attached to it) that it nowhere contradicts love.”
“we wildly gather the honey of the visible, in order to store it in the great golden hive of the invisible.”
e333mily's review against another edition
5.0
“What is greatest about our existence and renders it precious and ineffable also makes very careful use of our painful experiences to enter into our soul.”
“The worst things, and even despair, are only a kind of abundance and an onslaught of existence that one decision of the heart could turn into its opposite. Where things become truly difficult and unbearable, we find ourselves in a place already very close to its transformation.”
“Each time we tackle something with joy, each time we open our eyes toward a yet untouched distance, we transform not only this and the next moment, but we also rearrange and gradually absorb the past inside of us. We dissolve the foreign body of pain…”
“The worst things, and even despair, are only a kind of abundance and an onslaught of existence that one decision of the heart could turn into its opposite. Where things become truly difficult and unbearable, we find ourselves in a place already very close to its transformation.”
“Each time we tackle something with joy, each time we open our eyes toward a yet untouched distance, we transform not only this and the next moment, but we also rearrange and gradually absorb the past inside of us. We dissolve the foreign body of pain…”
sendlasagna's review against another edition
only really enjoyed 22 to Catherine Marthe Louise Pozzi, August 21, 1924 (Page 82)
shaz66's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
4.0
zabeishumanish's review against another edition
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
4.5
Ulrich Baer's preface to this book contained more of the content I was expecting from this book than any of Rilke's letters did. This is not a complaint, Rilke's letters surprised me. I find that shock more moving in my intellectual contemplation than my initial expectations for the letters would have provoked. However, Baer's highly polished reflective preface is undoubtedly the most singularly moving element of this book. Baer's preface is the perfect complement to Rilke's casually compassionate letters. Rilke's letters create joy and reflection, while Baer's preface jumps past reflection to attack the letters' inherent meaning. Rilke's letters build reflection within the reader slowly like a single drop of rain becoming a squall, while Baer's preface is a bucket of water being dropped upon the reader. The reader is already soaked before the eye of the storm hits.
The book and letters also lead me to far more insights into Rilke's writing than I was anticipating from a collection of Rilke's personal letters that are ostensibly unrelated to the concepts of literature. These insights are often clear in the content of Rilke's letters, but many of these insights are also specifically due to clever editing choices.
The book and letters also lead me to far more insights into Rilke's writing than I was anticipating from a collection of Rilke's personal letters that are ostensibly unrelated to the concepts of literature. These insights are often clear in the content of Rilke's letters, but many of these insights are also specifically due to clever editing choices.
Does the person who passes away not leave all the things he had begun in hundreds of ways to be continued by those who out live him, if they had shared any kind of inner bond at all? (10)