Find out the reason that commands you to write see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write. But does youth have patience for such practice? And, in this day and age, when “youth” lasts well into the fifties, does anyone? Back to Rilke: It’s all about the tortoise, the writer willing to let his poetry steep, age, meld its flavors.
Sound advice, if you’re one of these poets in a hurry. You are looking outside, and that is what you should most avoid right now. Now (since you have said you want my advice) I beg you to stop doing that sort of thing. You compare them with other poems, and you are upset when certain editors reject your work. “You ask whether your verses are any good. One thing the first letter establishes quickly is that Rilke falls in with those poets who believe you should write for yourself as opposed to for markets (for others, if you will): But mostly a philosophy on life and insight into the way Rilke thinks.
If you read Letters to a Young Poet today (there are ten in toto), you’ll see that the first letter contains the most advice about poetry per se.
“Would you please read my poems and tell me if I’m horrible at this?” At the same time, this collection, in Stephen Mitchell's definitive translation, reveals the thoughts and feelings of one of the greatest poets and most distinctive sensibilities of the twentieth century.This week marks the 115th anniversary of Rainer Maria Rilke’s first letter to Franz Xaver Kappus.
Eloquent and personal, Rilke's meditations on the creative process, the nature of love, the wisdom of children, and the importance of solitude offer a wealth of spiritual and practical guidance for anyone. The two never met, but over a period of several years Rilke wrote him these ten letters, which have been cherished by hundreds of thousands of readers for what Stephen Mitchell calls in his Foreword the "vibrant and deeply felt experience of life" that informs them. Written when the poet was himself still a young man, with most of his greatest work before him, they were addressed to a student who had sent Rilke some of his own writing, asking for advice on becoming a writer. Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet are arguably the most famous and beloved letters of the twentieth century.
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