Synopses & Reviews
Rainer Maria Rilke criss-crossed Europe; he visited Russia and sailed on the Nile. Yet over and over again, he went to Venice: St. Mark’s Square and the Lido, the Doge’s Palace and the Grand Canal. Travel for Rilke was a passion, a way of life, and it served a single purpose: to seek impulses, stimuli, and ideas for writing. Venice, above all others, enthralled and provoked him. Using his poems and extensive letters, Birgit Haustedt shows Rilke’s intimate relationship with the city he loved the most. As Rilke himself wrote, "Poems are not, as people think, feelings . . . they are practical experiences."
Synopsis
Travel was the passion of Rilke's life, and he repeatedly returned to Venice for inspiration
Synopsis
Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926) criss-crossed Europe; he visited Russia and sailed on the Nile. And over and over again, he went to Venice: St Mark's Square and the Lido, the Doge's Palace and the Grand Canal were his intimate friends. He visited the city ten times; the first was a weekend in March 1897, the last, 13 July 1920. Venise, as he called her amorously, enthralled and provoked him: 'For a long time I have been unable even to glance casually at a magazine or book without reading the word Venice; wherever I look, it appears before my eyes at the last moment.'
About the Author
Birgit Haustedt taught for several years at the University of Salerno and now works as a freelance writer in Hamburg.