The Testament: (& Other Texts)

The Testament: (& Other Texts) - Paperback

$22.68
$22.68
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The Testament: (& Other Texts)
  • The Testament: (& Other Texts)
The Testament: (& Other Texts) - Paperback

The Testament: (& Other Texts) - Paperback

by Rainer Maria Rilke
$22.68
$22.68

Book Overview

by Rainer Maria Rilke (Author), Mark Kanak (Translator), Rainer J. Hanshe (Editor)

Rilke's Testament opens with the outbreak of WWI, a devastating world event that prevents the poet from returning to the "incomparable city of Paris," and which is entwined with his own debilitating crises.

In this decisive period, before which recovery or death waits, Rilke undergoes a kind of auto-da-fé and gives us a record of his failure and achievement. With insights into what he called his peculiar fate, the poet forges a will and testament, which he says "will remain his last, even if his heart still faced many years of challenges ahead." Is this the final word on his struggle between love in life and love transformed into the mosaic of art? Written while suffering an impasse with the Duino Elegies and just before he and Merline Klossowska discover the Chateau de Muzot, which would become a fertile sanctuary for the nomadic poet, Rilke turns to translation as a pontifex to carry him through the muteness of his crises. Having at last opened some free associative realm, he begins sketching terse reflections, lyrical draft letters, and dense, wistful prose, fragmentary writings that speak to the powers of destruction and creation. Long secret, this enigmatic and charged series of experimental texts is the record of the close of a remarkable winter, wherein the work of poetry, the artist's struggle with life, is tested in the crucible of solitude and the sinister expanse of blank pages. An illuminating ars poetica, Rilke's Testament constitutes the mortal risk of not going beyond love, and the risk of the potential death of the artist, where the silencing of the logos puts creative potency under threat.​This world premiere English translation also includes essays on politics, poetry, sound, the sacred and sexuality, and the complete poem sequence "From the Literary Estate of Count C.W.," all works dating from the 'testament years.' The Testament (& Other Texts) documents a creative interregnum and is the dark passageway between the Duino Elegies and The Sonnets to Orpheus.
Number of Pages: 202
Dimensions: 0.46 x 8 x 5 IN
Publication Date: December 04, 2025
ISBN9781940625805
Author Rainer Maria Rilke
PublisherContra Mundum Press
GenreLiterature
FormatPaperback
PublishedDecember 2025
LanguageENG- English
Pages202
Weight1.0 lb
Target AudienceAdults
Print SizeStandard Print

Related Subjects

Nonfiction Poetry

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More by Rainer Maria Rilke

Sonnets to Orpheus: A New Translation (Bilingual Edition)

Sonnets to Orpheus: A New Translation (Bilingual Edition) - Paperback

Sonnets to Orpheus: A New Translation (Bilingual Edition) - Paperback

By Rainer Maria Rilke

About Rainer Maria Rilke

Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926) was one of the greatest lyric German-language poets. Born in Prague, he published his first book of poems, Leben und Lieber, at age 19. In 1897 he met Lou Andreas-Salomé, the talented and spirited daughter of a Russian army officer, who influenced him deeply. In 1902 he became a friend, and for a time the secretary, of Rodin, and it was during his 12-year Paris residence that Rilke enjoyed his greatest poetic activity. In 1919 he went to Switzerland where he spent the last years of his life. It was there that he wrote his last two works, Duino Elegies (1923) and Sonnets to Orpheus (1923).

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