The Dark Interval Read online

  May you, dear friend, find some advice and elucidation in this letter and, for the rest, rely on yourself for help. For: I do not know whether I could ever say more.

  Yours,

  R. M. Rilke

  Rainer Maria Rilke: Life and Works

  1875 December 4. René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke is born in Prague, in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, to rail inspector Joseph and his wife, Sophie (Phia) Rilke (born Entz).

  1882 Attends elementary school of a Catholic order.

  1884 Parents separate. Rilke is raised by his mother.

  1886 Admission to military youth academy of St. Pölten.

  1890 Attends a military academy in Mährisch-Weisskirchen (now Hranice, Czech Republic).

  1891 Admission to trade school in Linz.

  1892 Prepares privately for baccalaureate in Prague.

  1894 First collection of poems, Lives and Songs.

  1895 Baccalaureate. University studies in Prague (art history, philosophy, and literature).

  1896 University studies in Munich.

  1897 Begins a four-year love affair with Lou Andreas-Salomé in Munich. Moves to Berlin.

  1898 Travels to Italy. Since August in Berlin. Publication of the collection of novels and sketches, Am Leben hin (Near Life).

  1899 First travels to Russia with Andreas-Salomé. Visits in Moscow with Leonid Pasternak and Leo Tolstoy.

  1900 Second visit to Russia with Andreas-Salomé. Visit to the artists’ colony in Worpswede (northern Germany) at the invitation of painter Heinrich Vogeler.

  1901 Marriage to sculptor Clara Westhoff. Birth of his only child, Ruth.

  1902 Publication of The Book of Images. Trip to Paris. Publication of the commissioned monograph Auguste Rodin.

  1903 Travels to Viareggio, Rome, Florence, Munich, Paris, and other locations in Europe.

  1904 Visit to Sweden.

  1905 Worpswede and Paris. Rilke lives as the assistant to Auguste Rodin in Meudon (near Paris). Publication of The Book of Hours.

  1906 Death of Rilke’s father. End of the relationship with Rodin. Rilke moves to Paris. Travels to Belgium and Capri.

  1907 Publication of New Poems. Love affair with Mimi Romanelli.

  1908 With his family in Bremen. Travels to Berlin, Munich, Rome, Capri, Florence. The New Poems: Second Part.

  1910 Travels to Algiers and Tunis. Publication of The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge.

  1911 Travels to Egypt, Italy, Bohemia, Germany, and France. Rilke spends part of the winter at Duino Castle (owned by the Thurn und Taxis family) in northern Italy.

  1912 Travels to Spain.

  1914 Rilke finds himself in Munich at the beginning of the war and as a citizen of the Austro-Hungarian Empire is not permitted to return to Paris. He loses most of his belongings that remain in Paris.

  1915 Encounter with Sigmund Freud in Munich. Rilke is drafted into the Austro-Hungarian army, despite attempts to defer.

  1916 Call to active duty, then service in the war archives in Vienna. Return to Munich.

  1918 Meeting and love affair with the poet Claire Studer (later the wife of poet Yvan Goll). After the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Rilke automatically becomes a Czech citizen.

  1919 Meeting with Andreas-Salomé. Visit to Switzerland from Munich. Rilke begins his relationship with the painter Baladine Klossowska, and helps in educating and providing for her two sons, Pierre and Balthasar (later the painter Balthus). Appeals to influential patrons to obtain a residency permit in Switzerland.

  1921 Rilke moves into a small stone house, Château de Muzot, near Sierre in the Swiss canton of Valais, which is first rented and then purchased for him by his sponsor Werner Reinhart.

  1922 Completion of the Duino Elegies and creation of Sonnets to Orpheus (both works appear in 1923). Marriage of daughter Ruth.

  1923 First stay in a sanatorium in Val-Mont sur Territet near Lake Geneva.

  1924 Paul Valéry and Clara Westhoff, among other guests, visit Rilke in Switzerland. Another stay at the clinic in Val-Mont.

  1925 January to August in Paris, then back at Muzot. From December at the clinic in Val-Mont.

  1926 Return to Muzot in June. From November in Val-Mont, where he receives a diagnosis of leukemia. Rilke dies on December 29 in Val-Mont.

  1927 Rilke is buried on January 2 at the cemetery in Raron, in the canton of Valais. In the fall, a six-volume Collected Works is published.

  TRANSLATED AND EDITED BY ULRICH BAER

  Letters on Life: New Prose Translations

  The Dark Interval: Letters on Loss, Grief, and Transformation

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  RAINER MARIA RILKE (1875–1926), born in Prague into a German-speaking family, is widely recognized as one of the world’s great poets. He is the author of the novel The Notebook of Malte Laurids Brigge and several books of poetry, including The Book of Hours, The Book of Images, New Poems, The Life of the Virgin Mary, The Duino Elegies, and Sonnets to Orpheus. He wrote approximately fifteen thousand letters to an enormous range of recipients. Letters to a Young Poet and Letters on Life have inspired countless readers.

  ABOUT THE EDITOR AND TRANSLATOR

  ULRICH BAER was educated at Harvard and Yale and has been awarded John Simon Guggenheim, DAAD, Paul Getty, and Alexander von Humboldt fellowships. He is Vice Provost and Professor of German, Comparative Literature, at New York University. His previous books include Remnants of Song: Trauma and the Experience of Modernity in Charles Baudelaire and Paul Celan, Spectral Evidence: The Photography of Trauma, The Rilke Alphabet, Beggar’s Chicken: Stories from Shanghai, and We Are But a Moment. He edited 110 Stories: New York Writes After September 11, and edited and translated Letters on Life: New Prose Translations, published by the Modern Library.

  What’s next on

  your reading list?

  Discover your next

  great read!

  * * *

  Get personalized book picks and up-to-date news about this author.

  Sign up now.