M. D. Herter Norton

Born in Prague when it was part of the Austro-Hungarian empire and recognized today as a master of verse, poet Rainer Maria Rilke was considerably less well known in 1902 when he received a heartfelt letter from an aspiring poet. A 19-year-old student sent Rilke some of his verses, seeking an opinion of their worth. Rilke declined to offer a critique, instead encouraging the student to rely upon his own inner judgment: "Nobody can advise and help...

Breathing, you invisible poem! World-space in pure continuous interchange with my own being. Equipose in which I rhythmically transpire. Written only four years before Rilke's death, this sequence of sonnets, varied in form yet consistently structured, stands as the poet's final masterwork. In these meditations on the constant flux of our world and the ephemerality of experience, Rilke envisions death not only as one among many of life's transformations...

This book examines the concepts of ?classic? and ?romantic? in their historical contexts and discusses the varying interpretations they have undergone, separately and in relation to each other. For each period, the author surveys the development of style characteristics, the treatment of rhythm, meter, and temp, of harmony and tonality, of motive and theme, genres and forms. He also considers such problems as national styles and the social position...

A semi-autobiographical novel in the form of a diary. A young man "lives in a cheap room in Paris while his belongings rot in storage. Every person he sees seems to carry their death within them and with little but a library card to distinguish him from the city's untouchables, he thinks of the deaths, and ghosts, of his aristocratic family, of which he is the sole living descendant."--Goodreads