If your daily life seems poor, do not blame it; blame yourself that you are not poet enough to call forth its riches; for to the creator these is no poverty and no poor indifferent place. And even if you were in some prison the walls of which let none of the sounds of the world come to your senses-- would you not then still have your childhood, that precious, kingly possession, that treasure-house of memories? Turn your attention there. Try to bring up the sunken sensations of that far past; your personality will grow more firm, your solitude will widen and will become a dusky dwelling by which the noise of others passes far away.

Rainer Maria Rilke (more by this author)

1875-1926 (Age at death: 51 approx.)

Rene Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke (4 December 1875 - 29 December 1926)""better known as Rainer Maria Rilke (German: [ËˆÊaÉªnÉ maËˆÊiËa ËˆÊÉªlkÉ™])""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. Among English-language readers, his best-known works include the poetry collections Duino Elegies (Duineser Elegien) and Sonnets to Orpheus (Die Sonette an Orpheus), the semi-autobiographical novel The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge (Die Aufzeichnungen des Malte Laurids Brigge), and a collection of ten letters that was published after his death under the title Letters to a Young Poet (Briefe an einen jungen Dichter). In the later 20th century, his work has found new audiences through its use by New Age theologians and self-help authors, and through frequent quoting in television programs, books and motion pictures. In the United States, Rilke is one of the more popular, best-selling poets""along with 13th-century Sufi mystic Rumi and 20th-century Lebanese-American poet Khalil Gibran.

Author Information from Wikipedia

Country: Austria

Type: Prose
Context: Unknown
Source: Letters To a Young Poet