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Rilke in Paris
Rainer Maria Rilke offers a compelling portrait of Parisian life, art, and culture at the beginning of the 20th century
In 1902, the young German poet Rainer Maria Rilke travelled to Paris to write a monograph on the sculptor Auguste Rodin. He returned many times over the course of his life, by turns inspired and appalled by the city’s high culture and low society, and his writings give a fascinating insight into Parisian art and culture in the last century.
This book brings together Rilke’s sublime poetic meditations on existence Notes on the Melody of Things and the first English translation of Rilke’s experiences in Paris as observed by his French translator Maurice Betz.
In 1902, the young German poet Rainer Maria Rilke travelled to Paris to write a monograph on the sculptor Auguste Rodin. He returned many times over the course of his life, by turns inspired and appalled by the city’s high culture and low society, and his writings give a fascinating insight into Parisian art and culture in the last century.
This book brings together Rilke’s sublime poetic meditations on existence Notes on the Melody of Things and the first English translation of Rilke’s experiences in Paris as observed by his French translator Maurice Betz.
144 pages, Paperback
First published July 12, 2012
5 people are currently reading
332 people want to read
About the author
Rainer Maria Rilke
1,807 books6,963 followersA mystic lyricism and precise imagery often marked verse of German poet Rainer Maria Rilke, whose collections profoundly influenced 20th-century German literature and include
The Book of Hours
(1905) and
The Duino Elegies
(1923).
People consider him of the greatest 20th century users of the language.
His haunting images tend to focus on the difficulty of communion with the ineffable in an age of disbelief, solitude, and profound anxiety — themes that tend to position him as a transitional figure between the traditional and the modernist poets.
His two most famous sequences include the Sonnets to Orpheus , and his most famous prose works include the Letters to a Young Poet and the semi-autobiographical The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge .
He also wrote more than four hundred poems in French, dedicated to the canton of Valais in Switzerland, his homeland of choice.
People consider him of the greatest 20th century users of the language.
His haunting images tend to focus on the difficulty of communion with the ineffable in an age of disbelief, solitude, and profound anxiety — themes that tend to position him as a transitional figure between the traditional and the modernist poets.
His two most famous sequences include the Sonnets to Orpheus , and his most famous prose works include the Letters to a Young Poet and the semi-autobiographical The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge .
He also wrote more than four hundred poems in French, dedicated to the canton of Valais in Switzerland, his homeland of choice.
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
December 19, 2012
Rilke, on earth, lived a life akin to a pre-natal being, one whose sensations in existence remained as homogenous and pure as his time spent in the womb. He rejected birth and death as a consequence for existence, determining that this paradox was the reason behind which he would discover the absolute, i.e. through his own modifications of reality. Jean-Paul Sartre writing of Kierkegaard said ‘The beginning of the thinker’s existence is analogous to a birth. This is not a rejection but a displacement of the beginning. Before birth there was non-being; then comes the leap…’. Every morning in Paris, amid the ash-heaps of dreams, Rilke awoke to the metaphysical and limbless stump of his own still absent body. He saw the world as if between the parenthesis of each new death, whether one of his own or that of another human being. Later on, in The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge, he would explain the great existential anxiety at the heart of his work, the praxis that escaped him even in the process of finding a certitude for it:
‘And when I think about the others I have seen or heard of: it is always the same. They all had a death of their own. Those men who carried it in their armour, inside themselves, like a prisoner; those women who grew very old and small, and then on an enormous bed, as if on the stage of a theatre, in front of the whole family and the assembled servants and dogs, discreetly and with the greatest dignity passed away. The children too, even the very small ones, didn’t have just any child’s death; they gathered themselves and died what they already were and what they would have become. (…) And what a melancholy beauty this gave to women when they were pregnant and stood there, with their slender hands instinctively resting on their large bellies, in which there were two fruits: a child and a death. Didn’t the dense, almost nourishing smile on their emptied faces come from their sometimes feeling that both were growing inside them?’
Paul Stubbs
http://paulstubbspoet.wordpress.com/2...
‘And when I think about the others I have seen or heard of: it is always the same. They all had a death of their own. Those men who carried it in their armour, inside themselves, like a prisoner; those women who grew very old and small, and then on an enormous bed, as if on the stage of a theatre, in front of the whole family and the assembled servants and dogs, discreetly and with the greatest dignity passed away. The children too, even the very small ones, didn’t have just any child’s death; they gathered themselves and died what they already were and what they would have become. (…) And what a melancholy beauty this gave to women when they were pregnant and stood there, with their slender hands instinctively resting on their large bellies, in which there were two fruits: a child and a death. Didn’t the dense, almost nourishing smile on their emptied faces come from their sometimes feeling that both were growing inside them?’
Paul Stubbs
http://paulstubbspoet.wordpress.com/2...
March 22, 2019
"I am in Paris; those who learn this are glad, most of them envy me. They are right. It is a great city; great and full of strange temptations." from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Ranier Maria Rilke
I was in my late 20s when I discovered Ranier Maria Rilke. Although I have revisited his poetry over the years and read biographies and books about Rilke it has been forty years since I last read The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge, the composition of which figures in Rilke in Paris.
I opened up my copy and was amazed to find underlinings and notations and bent pages and bookmarks. How could I have forgotten this book?
"I have succumbed to these temptations, and this has brought about certain changes, if not in my character, at least in my outlook on the world, and, in any case in my life." from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Ranier Maria Rilke
Rilke in Paris focuses on the writer's time in Paris. Rilke first came to Paris in 1902 as a young man. By 1926 he had died of leukemia. Betz plumbs letters and excerpts from Rilke's works to illustrate the city's influence on Rilke, forming his artistic vision, especially as related to his writing of the highly personal Notebooks.
Also included is Rilke's poem essay Notes On the Melody of Things.
The book is a concise overview of Rilke's life from the young poet seeking a mentor through his development as a writer, including his influences. I was interested to read how Nietzsche's The Birth of Tragedy influenced Rilke.
Beautiful black and white photographs of Rilke's Paris illustrate the text.
An entirely different conception of all things had developed in me under these influences; certain differences have appeared that separate me from other men, more than anything heretofore. A world transformed. A new life filled with new meanings." from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Ranier Maria Rilke
We encounter Rilke as a solitary whose quest for authenticity separated him from others so that even when they were in the same city he only dined with his wife weekly. He believed his mentor, the sculptor Rodin when he preached that artists must give up personal life and happiness for their art. Rilke had presented himself to Rodin and was taken in, working as a personal secretary in exchange. A break forced Rilke on his own, and he took residence in Paris, and over the next twenty years, he returned to "the same Paris" between his wanderings across Europe.
Rilke spent time in the Luxembourg Gardens, observing and learning from the beauty and the ugliness he saw. I recalled one of my favorite paintings from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, In the Luxembourg Gardens by John Singer Sargent, even if it was painted in 1879. I wanted to be transported into that scene.
"For the moment I find it a little hard because everything is too new. I am a beginner in my own circumstances." from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Ranier Maria Rilke
I love to learn how writers work. Betz offers us a detailed look into the "Genesis" of The Notebooks. First came Rilke's encounter with the story of a poet who had lived in Paris for some time, and feeling a failure, died at age thirty-two. Rilke saw the Notebooks as a "sequel to The Stories of God." He became haunted by his imagined poet Malte. He worked on the book for years; "Prose must be built like a cathedral," he wrote Rodin.
"My God, if any of it could be shared! But would it be then, would it be? No, it is only at the price of solitude." from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Ranier Maria Rilke
The Notebooks "is a confession and a lyrical novel of sorts, a study in psychology and a treatise on the interior life," Betz wrote, "a moving example of maturation through solitude and lucid contemplation of the loftiest problems in life." I am glad to have read Rilke in Paris for it has brought The Notebooks back into my life.
I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.
I was in my late 20s when I discovered Ranier Maria Rilke. Although I have revisited his poetry over the years and read biographies and books about Rilke it has been forty years since I last read The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge, the composition of which figures in Rilke in Paris.
I opened up my copy and was amazed to find underlinings and notations and bent pages and bookmarks. How could I have forgotten this book?
"I have succumbed to these temptations, and this has brought about certain changes, if not in my character, at least in my outlook on the world, and, in any case in my life." from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Ranier Maria Rilke
Rilke in Paris focuses on the writer's time in Paris. Rilke first came to Paris in 1902 as a young man. By 1926 he had died of leukemia. Betz plumbs letters and excerpts from Rilke's works to illustrate the city's influence on Rilke, forming his artistic vision, especially as related to his writing of the highly personal Notebooks.
Also included is Rilke's poem essay Notes On the Melody of Things.
The book is a concise overview of Rilke's life from the young poet seeking a mentor through his development as a writer, including his influences. I was interested to read how Nietzsche's The Birth of Tragedy influenced Rilke.
Beautiful black and white photographs of Rilke's Paris illustrate the text.
An entirely different conception of all things had developed in me under these influences; certain differences have appeared that separate me from other men, more than anything heretofore. A world transformed. A new life filled with new meanings." from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Ranier Maria Rilke
We encounter Rilke as a solitary whose quest for authenticity separated him from others so that even when they were in the same city he only dined with his wife weekly. He believed his mentor, the sculptor Rodin when he preached that artists must give up personal life and happiness for their art. Rilke had presented himself to Rodin and was taken in, working as a personal secretary in exchange. A break forced Rilke on his own, and he took residence in Paris, and over the next twenty years, he returned to "the same Paris" between his wanderings across Europe.
Rilke spent time in the Luxembourg Gardens, observing and learning from the beauty and the ugliness he saw. I recalled one of my favorite paintings from the Philadelphia Museum of Art, In the Luxembourg Gardens by John Singer Sargent, even if it was painted in 1879. I wanted to be transported into that scene.
"For the moment I find it a little hard because everything is too new. I am a beginner in my own circumstances." from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Ranier Maria Rilke
I love to learn how writers work. Betz offers us a detailed look into the "Genesis" of The Notebooks. First came Rilke's encounter with the story of a poet who had lived in Paris for some time, and feeling a failure, died at age thirty-two. Rilke saw the Notebooks as a "sequel to The Stories of God." He became haunted by his imagined poet Malte. He worked on the book for years; "Prose must be built like a cathedral," he wrote Rodin.
"My God, if any of it could be shared! But would it be then, would it be? No, it is only at the price of solitude." from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge by Ranier Maria Rilke
The Notebooks "is a confession and a lyrical novel of sorts, a study in psychology and a treatise on the interior life," Betz wrote, "a moving example of maturation through solitude and lucid contemplation of the loftiest problems in life." I am glad to have read Rilke in Paris for it has brought The Notebooks back into my life.
I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.
June 27, 2019
Paris both fundamentally oppressed Rilke, compelling him to depart elsewhere, and summoned him back with a kind of nostalgic urgency, which he was unable to resist.
My prior knowledge of Rainer Maria Rilke's writing was limited to Letters to a Young Poet (1929) which is a truly inspiring collection of Rilke's replies to the letters of Franz Kappus, an aspiring poet, who sought Rilke's advice on how to become a better writer, but I've been intrigued to learn more about the life of this enigmatic and influential poet, so I was excited to read this book which focuses on the time period that Rilke spent in the city that inspired him the most.
In fact, it is evident that, along with Italy in a supporting role, France and French culture are the dominant guiding forces of Rilke's adult life, exemplified perhaps by the fact that he celebrated this relationship by writing some four hundred poems in French, translated a clutch of French poets, chose to settle in a French-speaking region and became, in his later years, more deeply absorbed in the work of the French poet Paul Valéry than in that of any other poet.
Rilke in Paris (translated by Will Stone) contains fragments of Rilke's letters and diary entries about his Paris experiences, his Notes on the Melody of Things, as well as observations from his first translator and close collaborator Maurice Betz that together provide a very brief yet engaging glimpse into Rilke's life in Paris and how his experiences in France shaped him as an artist.
Rilke arrived in Paris for the first time on 28 August, 1902, to write a monograph on the famous French sculptor Auguste Rodin (1840-1917), who is widely considered to be the father of modern sculpture, and it seems that meeting Rodin was a pivotal moment in Rilke's artistic development. The excerpts from letters and diary entries form an impression of Rilke as a pretty solitary, introspective young man, who was constantly seeking guidance on how to lead a creative life. In Rodin, who was known for his incredible artistic skills and rigorous work ethic, it appears that Rilke finally finds what he's been looking for, however, the master-disciple relationship between the two artists didn't play out exactly as Rilke had envisioned it. Rodin assigned him the role of his personal secretary (but basically treated him as a lowly intern) and, while it's apparent from Rilke's account that he carried some resentment about it, Rodin actually managed to give him some very valuable advice and much-needed direction that would help Rilke develop his writing skills.
The most notable testament to Rilke's creative time in Paris is his semi-autobiographical novel The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge (1910) that encapsulates his experiences in Paris and shows how much he grew as a writer and drew inspiration from his contemporaries in the Parisian literary community of the time. At the same time, despite how much he loved living in Paris, it was fascinating to learn that Rilke often struggled with fitting in and being accepted by some of his peers and heroes in the Parisian literary scene. Fortunately, Rodin came to the rescue again, reminding him that he should be focusing all of his energy on his art, instead of getting too involved in the endless, superficial gatherings of the Parisian social scene that threatened to interfere with his work.
Rilke in Paris focuses on a very specific period in the poet's life and provides a concise overview of Rilke's time in Paris without going into too much detail. While I think this book might be better suited for aficionados of Rilke's work, it could also serve as a good primer before diving into a more comprehensive autobiography on Rilke or even a more detailed study of this creative period in Rilke's life, such as the relatively recent non-fiction book You Must Change Your Life: The Story of Rainer Maria Rilke and Auguste Rodin by Rachel Corbett.
February 25, 2019
‘I sense that to work is to live without dying…’
This book details the poet Rilke's life in Paris, with splashes of his travels outside of France.
I've only read his "Letters to a Young Poet", which is a gracious and posthumous collection of letters. This book contains not only journals and letters by Rilke, but observations of Paris, much of what would envelop and become Rilke's "The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge".
Overall, this is a tidy, and quite short book, but it does contain many perceptions of Paris that are deeply interesting, especially those about death.
The overriding atmosphere in all Rilke’s communication is one of the overt presence of death, exemplified by the hospitals that he sees on his perambulations. ‘I see now why they figure so often in Verlaine, Baudelaire and Mallarmé, you suddenly feel that in this city there are legions of the sick, armies of the dying, whole populations of the dead.’
I liked reading about Stefan Zweig having seen Rilke on a bus:
Zweig also recounts an earlier sighting of Rilke, when he chanced upon the poet riding the top deck of an omnibus, as if in a trance, curiously out of place amongst the other passengers. The sight of Rilke awkwardly embedded in this modern vehicle, silently passing in anonymity and unaware of his friend’s presence, had clearly touched Zweig.
And oh, the suffering paragraphs:
I know of no incantation; it is God who must pronounce it when the times are completed. I can only wait patiently. I can only bear with faith that deep source that lives on these long days sealed within me, heavy as a stone. But life is there, and it wants to use me for everything, my stone and me. So then, I am lost and I suffer…
In summary, this book was interesting but brief; I'd like to have read a bit more about the context, which to me seems faint, apart from the actual descriptions of where Rilke physically roamed Paris. The good bits were Rilke's quotes interspersed with faint information.
May 1, 2019
This is really one for the Rilke aficionado rather than the general reader. I don’t know a lot about Rilke and have read very little but nevertheless I still got quite a lot from this exploration of his time in Paris, and found his thoughts and impressions of the city, with added observations from his translator Maurice Betz, very interesting. Rilke first went to Paris in 1902 to study Rodin, and on subsequent visits met many of the key names in the world of the arts. This short volume also includes Rilke’s essay on poetry “Notes on the Melody of Things” although I’m not quite sure what this has to do with the rest of the book. Overall an enjoyable excursion with Rilke through Paris and its inhabitants.
December 20, 2019
This is a short book to read before you begin Rilke's novel, The Notebooks of Malte Lauride Brigge, which took him 1902 to 1910 just to work on the drafting of it, and if you are in Paris, looking to scrap your entire itinerary for a more solitary time, walking around, going to bookshops, spending long hours reading and writing in the Bibliothèque nationale. . .
Intro:
- "seeking the best experiences and location from which to access his inwardness"
- "the location and atmosphere most conducive to unbroken solitude and steady unhindered work"
- fame: "the collection of misunderstandings that gather around a name"
- TRUST: "that reluctance to believe himself capable of working consistently enough to achieve anything of note"
In Paris:
- A few visits to the museums, solitary walks, long evenings of work.
- The evenings now belong to me: I shall be contented with reading books, making notes. Meditation, repose, solitude: all those things for which I am most nostalgic.
- at the hour when the Seine is like grey silk and when the lamplight falls upon it like cut jewels
- I still haven't seen and don't wish to see anybody, for the moment. I would like via some solitary path to arrive at work, to daily work, to the capacity to work.
- In this city, three years are but a single day. I stayed sitting a long time in the Luxembourg. I went to the museum so full of people and statues. A light autumn sun shone from time to time upon the Seine and warmed a bridge. And all this, is Paris.
Intro:
- "seeking the best experiences and location from which to access his inwardness"
- "the location and atmosphere most conducive to unbroken solitude and steady unhindered work"
- fame: "the collection of misunderstandings that gather around a name"
- TRUST: "that reluctance to believe himself capable of working consistently enough to achieve anything of note"
In Paris:
- A few visits to the museums, solitary walks, long evenings of work.
- The evenings now belong to me: I shall be contented with reading books, making notes. Meditation, repose, solitude: all those things for which I am most nostalgic.
- at the hour when the Seine is like grey silk and when the lamplight falls upon it like cut jewels
- I still haven't seen and don't wish to see anybody, for the moment. I would like via some solitary path to arrive at work, to daily work, to the capacity to work.
- In this city, three years are but a single day. I stayed sitting a long time in the Luxembourg. I went to the museum so full of people and statues. A light autumn sun shone from time to time upon the Seine and warmed a bridge. And all this, is Paris.
May 19, 2019
I'm a huge fan of Rilke to the point of reading Malte Lauris Brigge in German and loving it even it was quite hard.
This book is a treat if love Rilke as gives insight and help you to understand the men and the writer.
I loved everthing in his book and it's highly recommended!
Many thanks to the publisher and Edelweiss for this ARC, all opinions are mine.
This book is a treat if love Rilke as gives insight and help you to understand the men and the writer.
I loved everthing in his book and it's highly recommended!
Many thanks to the publisher and Edelweiss for this ARC, all opinions are mine.
May 31, 2013
I enjoyed it a lot and was pleasantly surprised to learn Rilke is credited with being a member of some of the earlier Existentialist. I've traveled to Paris, France and was impressed by the vibe of the place and am always curious how prominant literary/philosophical, etc... figures were influenced by that city and credited the atmosphere with influencing their work. Hence why I picked this book up. It's led me to Rilke's only novel, which I will be reading next.
July 1, 2014
If I had not kept in mind that this was first written quite some time ago by his trusted translator, I'd say this was an overly sweeping blasé generalization of Rilke. Given that's not true, 3 stars on depth (hindsight reduces this, Betz died in 1946), 4 stars for minor delving into Malte Laurids Brigge. And 5 stars for Notes on the Melody of Things-Rilke.
September 25, 2025
Real Rating: 3.75* of five
The Publisher Says: Rainer Maria Rilke offers a compelling portrait of Parisian life, art, and culture at the beginning of the 20th century
In 1902, the young German poet Rainer Maria Rilke travelled to Paris to write a monograph on the sculptor Auguste Rodin. He returned many times over the course of his life, by turns inspired and appalled by the city’s high culture and low society, and his writings give a fascinating insight into Parisian art and culture in the last century.
Much of this work, despite its perennial popularity in French, German, and Italian, has never before been translated into English. This book brings together Rilke’s sublime poetic meditations on existence Notes on the Melody of Things and the first English translation of Rilke’s experiences in Paris as observed by his French translator Maurice Betz.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: I've read as little poetry as I've been able to over course of the past sixty-plus years. I've stated why (I don't enjoy it), I've explained why (it's pretentious and condescending), and yet here I am reviewing with praise a book about a poet, by his French translator, published after his sad, early death from leukemia.
Praise?
Praise: The essay on why Rilke wrote poetry is beautiful, deeply moving, and really makes me wish I didn't hate the experience of reading the...stuff. Song lyrics are poetry, so why do I listen to music voluntarily if I hate the stuff in a song? It's in the essay. The melody of the world is not audible to all of us in the same way. I "hear" prose; Rilke "heard" poetry, and made some beautiful poems in the world's opinion. I'm not arguing they're not; based on the essay in here I will bet there are gorgeous poems to his name.
For those who like poetry. I am still not one of you.
Maurice Betz observed Rilke being in the Paris of his time with an intensity I reserve for my lovers. I would guess Rilke was a little bit aware of the depth of Betz's attention. Rilke was under the influence of Rodin and swayed by the older man's frankly nonsensical contention that artists, true artists regardless of métier, must forego personal life and the pursuit of family and sex and friendship. Hogwash! But Rilke did somewhat wake to the foolishness of that, though never completely; he was a rootless wanderer despite being married and fathering a child; not to mention an impressive sexual CV of important artists and creatives, as well as that aforementioned wife.
He was, in other words, the bog-standard thing of beauty and a boy forever; Peter-Panning his way through life and taking nothing but himself seriously. I read this between Betz's besotted lines. What a selfish, rotten way to live one's life. Yes, he wrote right nice. I'll agree to give him that. It does not, in my 2025 eyes, redeem his narcissistic personality that used and discarded multiple people.
But lawsy me, does Maurice Betz love him! It was warming to feel how much he resonated to the Rilke shy-boy charisma. The way he wrote about Rilke is so apt, so fully aware of him: "Paris both fundamentally oppressed Rilke, compelling him to depart elsewhere, and summoned him back with a kind of nostalgic urgency, which he was unable to resist. ... In fact, it is evident that, along with Italy in a supporting role, France and French culture are the dominant guiding forces of Rilke's adult life, exemplified perhaps by the fact that he celebrated this relationship by writing some four hundred poems in French, translated a clutch of French poets, chose to settle in a French-speaking region and became, in his later years, more deeply absorbed in the work of the French poet Paul Valéry than in that of any other poet."
With photos I can't show you, this text is very much more suited to someone who loves poetry, has more than a Wikipedia-level familiarity with his work; my main connection, and a pleasant one, is to Rilke's Francophilia, to his off-kilter sense of himself as other than how his friends saw him.
I'm glad I red the book. I'm glad I didn't know him, or he'd've got an earful about his using others. No loving Maurice Betz, me.
The Publisher Says: Rainer Maria Rilke offers a compelling portrait of Parisian life, art, and culture at the beginning of the 20th century
In 1902, the young German poet Rainer Maria Rilke travelled to Paris to write a monograph on the sculptor Auguste Rodin. He returned many times over the course of his life, by turns inspired and appalled by the city’s high culture and low society, and his writings give a fascinating insight into Parisian art and culture in the last century.
Much of this work, despite its perennial popularity in French, German, and Italian, has never before been translated into English. This book brings together Rilke’s sublime poetic meditations on existence Notes on the Melody of Things and the first English translation of Rilke’s experiences in Paris as observed by his French translator Maurice Betz.
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
My Review: I've read as little poetry as I've been able to over course of the past sixty-plus years. I've stated why (I don't enjoy it), I've explained why (it's pretentious and condescending), and yet here I am reviewing with praise a book about a poet, by his French translator, published after his sad, early death from leukemia.
Praise?
Praise: The essay on why Rilke wrote poetry is beautiful, deeply moving, and really makes me wish I didn't hate the experience of reading the...stuff. Song lyrics are poetry, so why do I listen to music voluntarily if I hate the stuff in a song? It's in the essay. The melody of the world is not audible to all of us in the same way. I "hear" prose; Rilke "heard" poetry, and made some beautiful poems in the world's opinion. I'm not arguing they're not; based on the essay in here I will bet there are gorgeous poems to his name.
For those who like poetry. I am still not one of you.
Maurice Betz observed Rilke being in the Paris of his time with an intensity I reserve for my lovers. I would guess Rilke was a little bit aware of the depth of Betz's attention. Rilke was under the influence of Rodin and swayed by the older man's frankly nonsensical contention that artists, true artists regardless of métier, must forego personal life and the pursuit of family and sex and friendship. Hogwash! But Rilke did somewhat wake to the foolishness of that, though never completely; he was a rootless wanderer despite being married and fathering a child; not to mention an impressive sexual CV of important artists and creatives, as well as that aforementioned wife.
He was, in other words, the bog-standard thing of beauty and a boy forever; Peter-Panning his way through life and taking nothing but himself seriously. I read this between Betz's besotted lines. What a selfish, rotten way to live one's life. Yes, he wrote right nice. I'll agree to give him that. It does not, in my 2025 eyes, redeem his narcissistic personality that used and discarded multiple people.
But lawsy me, does Maurice Betz love him! It was warming to feel how much he resonated to the Rilke shy-boy charisma. The way he wrote about Rilke is so apt, so fully aware of him: "Paris both fundamentally oppressed Rilke, compelling him to depart elsewhere, and summoned him back with a kind of nostalgic urgency, which he was unable to resist. ... In fact, it is evident that, along with Italy in a supporting role, France and French culture are the dominant guiding forces of Rilke's adult life, exemplified perhaps by the fact that he celebrated this relationship by writing some four hundred poems in French, translated a clutch of French poets, chose to settle in a French-speaking region and became, in his later years, more deeply absorbed in the work of the French poet Paul Valéry than in that of any other poet."
With photos I can't show you, this text is very much more suited to someone who loves poetry, has more than a Wikipedia-level familiarity with his work; my main connection, and a pleasant one, is to Rilke's Francophilia, to his off-kilter sense of himself as other than how his friends saw him.
I'm glad I red the book. I'm glad I didn't know him, or he'd've got an earful about his using others. No loving Maurice Betz, me.
March 22, 2019
I have loved Rilke's poetry and letters. They tempted me to learn German in my twenties. This is a slender compilation of his letters and diaries from his Paris days, strung together by his translator, Maurice Betz, and first published in 1941.
After wading through half of Betz's introduction, I skimmed the rest of his passages as much as I could. France and French culture were key to Rilke's development as an artist, he says, and so was the isolation of life in Paris, alone in a crowd, enjoying the fresh outsider's perspective in that stimulating, beautiful, and for him, somewhat frightening environment. Betz has Rilke on a pedestal, and echoes his writing style, including his most operatic tones. Only, of course, he's not Rilke. "An expressive ingredient for the precarious alchemy of his inwardness" is an example of how he likes to put things. Or, after Rodin rejects Rilke, "with a painful accent but not without dignity, the poet bade farewell to the artist whose bewitchment, in spite of everything, he continued to suffer." To be fair, this is Rilke himself writing to Rodin about the same event: "So there you are, great master, become invisible to me, as if by some ascension carried off to the heavens which are yours."
I love books like this for the first-person view of another time and place. Rilke's descriptions, of a rainy day, of jeweled lights dropping into the gray silk of the Seine, and the insights into his writing process, are worth the price of admission. Which for me, was only my time, since I got it free from NetGalley. And it made me want to reread the Letters.
After wading through half of Betz's introduction, I skimmed the rest of his passages as much as I could. France and French culture were key to Rilke's development as an artist, he says, and so was the isolation of life in Paris, alone in a crowd, enjoying the fresh outsider's perspective in that stimulating, beautiful, and for him, somewhat frightening environment. Betz has Rilke on a pedestal, and echoes his writing style, including his most operatic tones. Only, of course, he's not Rilke. "An expressive ingredient for the precarious alchemy of his inwardness" is an example of how he likes to put things. Or, after Rodin rejects Rilke, "with a painful accent but not without dignity, the poet bade farewell to the artist whose bewitchment, in spite of everything, he continued to suffer." To be fair, this is Rilke himself writing to Rodin about the same event: "So there you are, great master, become invisible to me, as if by some ascension carried off to the heavens which are yours."
I love books like this for the first-person view of another time and place. Rilke's descriptions, of a rainy day, of jeweled lights dropping into the gray silk of the Seine, and the insights into his writing process, are worth the price of admission. Which for me, was only my time, since I got it free from NetGalley. And it made me want to reread the Letters.
May 5, 2020
Rilke in Paris by Rainer Maria Rilke and Maurice Betz
How will this book help me in my journey?
I think that this was just a beautifully written book and it expanded my knowledge on art; literature, and sculpting.
The book is about the young poet Rilke who travels to Paris to write a piece on a famous sculptor and ends up falling in love with the city, coming back many times after that. He speaks and writes about his experience and how his space influenced his pieces.
What impacted me the most from this book? (theme, chapter, writing style, character, topics)
I think I saw how much your surroundings and culture can impact your piece. The people, the art, the food, the music, the weather, everything. As a writer, you are constantly absorbing your surroundings, as Rilke absorbed his. And the outcome of your piece will be very affected by your surroundings.
For example, if you want to write about beautiful sights, writing with a brick wall in front of you will not help you, it will limit you. But if you give yourself a rose garden as a view, or lavender fields, or a forest, you’ll have much beauty to admire and get influence from.
Favorite quote
There really where no “quotes on this book” but my favorite learning was the one I listed in the previous question. I loved understanding how your surroundings influence you as a writer and I found it to be completely true.
How much would you recommend this book and why?
9/10 for anyone who loves writing.
How will this book help me in my journey?
I think that this was just a beautifully written book and it expanded my knowledge on art; literature, and sculpting.
The book is about the young poet Rilke who travels to Paris to write a piece on a famous sculptor and ends up falling in love with the city, coming back many times after that. He speaks and writes about his experience and how his space influenced his pieces.
What impacted me the most from this book? (theme, chapter, writing style, character, topics)
I think I saw how much your surroundings and culture can impact your piece. The people, the art, the food, the music, the weather, everything. As a writer, you are constantly absorbing your surroundings, as Rilke absorbed his. And the outcome of your piece will be very affected by your surroundings.
For example, if you want to write about beautiful sights, writing with a brick wall in front of you will not help you, it will limit you. But if you give yourself a rose garden as a view, or lavender fields, or a forest, you’ll have much beauty to admire and get influence from.
Favorite quote
There really where no “quotes on this book” but my favorite learning was the one I listed in the previous question. I loved understanding how your surroundings influence you as a writer and I found it to be completely true.
How much would you recommend this book and why?
9/10 for anyone who loves writing.
January 23, 2021
So... probably not the best place to start to get familiar with Rainer Maria Rilke and his work. I've read excerpts from "Letters to a Young Poet" and have been wanting to delve deeper into Rilke's work but I admit this was not where I should have gone. I read in another review (Publisher's Weekly) where the reviewer wondered why this was translated and published at all, other than the fact that it's subject matter is a well-known poet. I'd have to agree. I don't think Maurice Betz's accounts of the minutiae of Rilke's life really add anything to the understanding of him as a poet or an artist. In fact, it kind of made me like Rilke even less. I think at this point in my life, I'm not as interested in affluent, sensitive, white European men. It just seems really affected and disingenuous. Still, I'll probably go back and read Notebooks at some point (since this is the work he focused on primarily during his time in Paris) and then come back to this book and see if it rings differently with me.
August 29, 2019
If you have spent time in Paris, you can pick this up and revisit. The atmosphere dominates but in this one it wraps around beautiful thoughtful language of the fine poet. If you haven't yet been to Paris, catch the next flight. The Yellow Jackets may be new but the contrasts are not.
Actually, one of my favorite quotes is in the introduction nicely written by Will Stone who also served as the translator. When the poet Rilke described the sculptor Rodin, Rilke observed that fame is "the collection of misunderstandings that collect around a name."
Actually, one of my favorite quotes is in the introduction nicely written by Will Stone who also served as the translator. When the poet Rilke described the sculptor Rodin, Rilke observed that fame is "the collection of misunderstandings that collect around a name."
December 29, 2023
As someone with MBA aspirations dancing in my head and Paris whispering promises of croissants and cobbled streets, I dove into "Rilke in Paris" expecting a charming love letter to the city. What I found wasn't quite that simple, but it was infinitely more enriching.
Though Rilke's Paris wasn't all sunshine and romance, but it was real, raw, and undeniably alive. It challenged him, pushed him to his limits, and ultimately, shaped him into the poet he became.
It was a fresh and an inspiring read!
Though Rilke's Paris wasn't all sunshine and romance, but it was real, raw, and undeniably alive. It challenged him, pushed him to his limits, and ultimately, shaped him into the poet he became.
It was a fresh and an inspiring read!
September 30, 2021
A glance at Rilke’s life in Paris - interspersed with a few pictures of locations and people.
This may be unfair to the book, but either Rilke’s existence was a bit dull, or the author (predominantly Rilke’s chief translator) fails to capture the colour of it.
I wouldn’t recommend it unless you’re already a student of Rilke, with this book read to serve the purpose of highlighting the background around the poet’s words.
This may be unfair to the book, but either Rilke’s existence was a bit dull, or the author (predominantly Rilke’s chief translator) fails to capture the colour of it.
I wouldn’t recommend it unless you’re already a student of Rilke, with this book read to serve the purpose of highlighting the background around the poet’s words.
May 24, 2025
rilke in paris is like your artsy friend who’s always like, “I’m so inspired by this city,” but also complains about how hard it is to find a good croissant. he’s vibing with rodin, getting existential in the streets, and writing poems about panthers in cages. It’s moody, introspective, and makes you wanna wear a beret and stare out a window
May 30, 2020
I wanted to read this as I was interested in Rilke's poetry. I think it would have been beneficial to have read more Rilke first however this was an interesting account of his time and friendships in Paris.
June 14, 2020
Incredibly boring! You must be a relative or superfan of Rilke or Rodin to care about anything in this. Summary: "He lived here and wrote this, he lived here and was inspired by this park, he had a lot of rich friends, and then died." No real biography. About 4 pages of poetry. Bye!
December 23, 2020
On how the many years in Paris influenced Rilke
February 2, 2023
Disappointingly and misleadingly doesn't actually feature much of Rilke's own writing, but an enjoyable read nonetheless.
February 24, 2022
Comparatively less engaging than 'The Heart', although I'm not sure whether it's the content (being the artist's lives) or the author's portrayal of it.
The latter half showcasing Rilke's meditations were far more intriguing.
Otherwise, a dull read.
The latter half showcasing Rilke's meditations were far more intriguing.
Otherwise, a dull read.
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