Quotes & anectdotes from
the wise,
the foolish,
the courageous &
the drunk

Rainer Maria Rilke Novelist

  • Gender: Male
  • Citizenship: Austria
  • Born: Dec 4, 1875
  • Died: Dec 29, 1926

René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke — better known as Rainer Maria Rilke — was a Bohemian-Austrian poet and novelist, "widely recognized as one of the most lyrically intense German-language poets", writing in both verse and highly lyrical prose. Several critics have described Rilke's work as inherently "mystical". His writings include one novel, several collections of poetry, and several volumes of correspondence in which he invokes haunting images that focus on the difficulty of communion with the ineffable in an age of disbelief, solitude, and profound anxiety. These deeply existential themes tend to position him as a transitional figure between the traditional and the modernist writers.

Rilke was born in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, travelled extensively throughout Europe, including Russia, Spain, Germany, France, Italy, and in his later years settled in Switzerland—settings that were key to the genesis and inspiration for many of his poems. While Rilke is most known for his contributions to German literature, over 400 poems were originally written in French and dedicated to the canton of Valais in Switzerland.

This is the miracle that happens every time to those who really love: the more they give, the more they possess.

More belongs to marriage than four legs in a bed.

One had to take some action against fear when once it laid hold of one.

The deepest experience of the creator is feminine, for it is experience of receiving and bearing.

No great art has ever been made without the artist having known danger.

I want to be with those who know secret things or else alone.

Love consists in this, that two solitudes protect and touch and greet each other.

The future enters into us, in order to transform itself in us, long before it happens.

A person isn't who they are during the last conversation you had with them - they're who they've been throughout your whole relationship.