A Year with Rilke: Even the Best Rulers

July 4, 2011

Even the Best Rulers

Rainer Maria Rilke

The tragedy of nations is perhaps this: that even the best rulers use up a piece of their people's future.

Early Journals

5 comments:

ElisabethMon Jul 04, 05:39:00 AM GMT+2
How much does this tendency of our leaders to use up a piece of our future based on the problems of power? I wonder. Rilke has such a way with words, in so few words he can illuminate so much. Thanks, Lorenzo.
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*Mon Jul 04, 07:46:00 AM GMT+2
A thoughtful, if not melancholy note on this 4th of July eve.
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More Than Meets the IMon Jul 04, 10:35:00 AM GMT+2
Need I draw associations between what Rilke says and Greece's current state of affairs? Rilke has this gift for putting in words what we can already see or feel.
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stevenMon Jul 04, 02:58:00 PM GMT+2
that's an interesting perspective. sort of like mortgaging what could be to create what might be. steven
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MaureenMon Jul 04, 08:59:00 PM GMT+2
So apt!
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"Everything is blooming most recklessly; if it were voices instead of colors, there would be an unbelievable shrieking into the heart of the night."

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

Go ahead, bloom recklessly!

About the Blog

We, Lorenzo and Ruth, are blog friends who, upon discovering our shared admiration for Rainer Maria Rilke's writings in a new volume of daily readings, decided to launch this blog.

Lorenzo (in Spain) has a home blog called The Alchemist's Pillow. Ruth (in the U.S.) has a home blog called synch-ro-ni-zing. Both of us also write poems and receive inspiration from Mary Oliver, Rumi, and many other poets.

We hope you will be inspired by this site, and we'd love to hear your responses in comments.

The Challenge of Translation

How can a poem written by Rilke, or anyone, be translated into another language, when a poem by its nature is a snapshot of a feeling, idea or story that also sings in lyricism, cadence, rhyme (sometimes) and other nuances that contribute to the poem intrinsically?

C. John Holcombe has thoroughly and generously explored the "problems" of translation in an article linked here, in which he explores the poem Herbsttag by Rilke. You can read fourteen versions of the first stanza by different translators, as well as a revelation of the issues of translation: word choice when there is no perfect equivalent; diction; word order (maintain the original or rearrange for effect?); rhyme; balance; and looking at the context of the poet's previous work.