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A review by bananabell
Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
3.0
Random waiter at olive garden asked me what book I was reading and when I showed her this book she said 'as you should!!!!' so thank you book for that interaction. Actually thank you to any books for existing at all; something about reading in public feels timeless. And nothing is better than sharing such a personal and solitary enjoyment with other people who do the same, that is, this activity called reading haha. I'm talking like Rilke I think.
These letters are a meditation on the necessity and wideness of solitude: "...it is always what I have already said: always the wish that you may find patience enough in yourself to endure, and simplicity enough to believe; that you may acquire more and more confidence in that which is difficult, and in your solitude among others. And for the rest, let life happen to you.' (74) The necessity of solitude for all human beings and its special role in the artist's life and the great gestation. The book cover has a snowy landscape, and I think this would be a great read for when winter is breaking into spring. Along with the notion of bringing forth ideas in patience and solitude, I liked his description of sorrow and how it is a threshold unto something new, 'as a house changes into which a guest has entered.' (64)
Rilke was writing to a fellow poet and student at a military school he attended. I feel like learning about the context of that will be important in understanding the text. A lot of meditative texts like this can become an amorphous abstract cloud of feel-good inspiration but I think the text can speak more tangibly to the human condition to see where Rilke is coming from and when he is removed mystery. Something like the military bears upon all of humanity, as it is linked to society, war, history, ...
While Rilke speaks on topics of such immediacy and importance, I also wonder if his starkly romantic spirit did not always result in the best advice for Kappus. Yes, solitude is important, and the noise of the world and its people can be harrowing and corrupting but it sometimes feels black and white. He lays emphasis on becoming but that becoming is difficult without some clear contours of hope. But I do not know Kappus, and I do not know the life and society he inhabited, so it is hard to say for sure. Sometimes a confident hope expressed by someone you admire deeply and hold in high regard (no matter how vague) is enough.
I read the translation by MD Herter Norton after seeing some inaccuracies pointed out about Mitchell on Reddit. Some passages were dense and unclear, because he speaks of very abstract topics, unseen themes of the heart and soul, and some parts were dense like I was reading philosophy (especially his going on about God being the beginning but also a phenomenon we build?? in letter six). I also wish I knew German so I could catch more of the nuances of the text. I might revisit this later through a different translator.
How incredible it would be to exchange correspondences with my heroes-!! yet if anything these letters demystify the notion of heroes and show they are only too human. Rilke directs Kappus to simply live his own life, be present to what is true. What words almost cannot attain, he comes close to. Like what Shia Lebouf did in that one video where he goes 'just--- do--- it!)%(^$#%!(*%#!*%#*!!!' It's less an exchange of information than it is an amelioration of deep anxiety. Which perhaps is what most artistic advice comes down to I guess.
These letters are a meditation on the necessity and wideness of solitude: "...it is always what I have already said: always the wish that you may find patience enough in yourself to endure, and simplicity enough to believe; that you may acquire more and more confidence in that which is difficult, and in your solitude among others. And for the rest, let life happen to you.' (74) The necessity of solitude for all human beings and its special role in the artist's life and the great gestation. The book cover has a snowy landscape, and I think this would be a great read for when winter is breaking into spring. Along with the notion of bringing forth ideas in patience and solitude, I liked his description of sorrow and how it is a threshold unto something new, 'as a house changes into which a guest has entered.' (64)
Rilke was writing to a fellow poet and student at a military school he attended. I feel like learning about the context of that will be important in understanding the text. A lot of meditative texts like this can become an amorphous abstract cloud of feel-good inspiration but I think the text can speak more tangibly to the human condition to see where Rilke is coming from and when he is removed mystery. Something like the military bears upon all of humanity, as it is linked to society, war, history, ...
While Rilke speaks on topics of such immediacy and importance, I also wonder if his starkly romantic spirit did not always result in the best advice for Kappus. Yes, solitude is important, and the noise of the world and its people can be harrowing and corrupting but it sometimes feels black and white. He lays emphasis on becoming but that becoming is difficult without some clear contours of hope. But I do not know Kappus, and I do not know the life and society he inhabited, so it is hard to say for sure. Sometimes a confident hope expressed by someone you admire deeply and hold in high regard (no matter how vague) is enough.
I read the translation by MD Herter Norton after seeing some inaccuracies pointed out about Mitchell on Reddit. Some passages were dense and unclear, because he speaks of very abstract topics, unseen themes of the heart and soul, and some parts were dense like I was reading philosophy (especially his going on about God being the beginning but also a phenomenon we build?? in letter six). I also wish I knew German so I could catch more of the nuances of the text. I might revisit this later through a different translator.
How incredible it would be to exchange correspondences with my heroes-!! yet if anything these letters demystify the notion of heroes and show they are only too human. Rilke directs Kappus to simply live his own life, be present to what is true. What words almost cannot attain, he comes close to. Like what Shia Lebouf did in that one video where he goes 'just--- do--- it!)%(^$#%!(*%#!*%#*!!!' It's less an exchange of information than it is an amelioration of deep anxiety. Which perhaps is what most artistic advice comes down to I guess.