Letters to a Young Poet Quotes

“How could we forget those ancient myths that stand at the beginning of all races, the myths about dragons that at the last moment are transformed into princesses? Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us...”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

topic:beautycourage

“Things aren’t all so tangible and sayable as people would usually have us believe; most experiences are unsayable, they happen in a space that no word has ever entered, and more unsayable than all other things are works of art, those mysterious...”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

topic:wordsexperienceart

“His life has much trouble and sadness, and remains far behind yours. If it were otherwise, he would never have been able to find those words.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

topic:wordssadness

“love your solitude and try to sing out with the pain it causes you.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

topic:pain

“We have no reason to harbor any mistrust against our world, for it is not against us. If it has terrors, they are our terrors; if it has abysses, these abysses belong to us; if there are dangers, we must try to love them.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

topic:worlddanger

“Don’t be too quick to draw conclusions from what happens to you; simply let it happen. Otherwise it will be too easy for you to look with blame (that is: morally) at your past, which naturally has a share in everything that now meets you.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

topic:changeexperience

“Perhaps many things inside you have been transformed; perhaps somewhere, deep inside your being, you have undergone important changes while you were sad.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

topic:changesadness

“The future stands still, dear Mr. Kappus, but we move in infinite space.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

topic:future

“if there is no communal feeling between you and other people, try to be near to things — they will not abandon you.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

topic:loneliness

“For they are the moments when something new has entered us, something unknown; our feelings grow mute in shy embarrassment, everything in us withdraws, a silence arises, and the new experience, which no one knows, stands in the midst of it all...”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

topic:experiencesilence