Review of Rilke’s The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge

I was once told that, as a small child, when the poet Rainer Maria Rilke approached his somewhat stern and distant parents in the evening, he would often be told ‘Is it that naughty Rainer there? We don’t want to see him. We want to see our lovely Maria.’ As a result, Rilke would retire and dress in girl’s clothing before returning to his parents’ presence. Whether this is true or not, it is certainly the case that Rilke’s subsequent work, among which the verse is much better known, often relates to transitions, changes and metamorphoses.

Read the full review here.

World’s Best Short Stories: Metamorphosis

Few people who have read the opening line of Franz Kafka’s Metamorphosis will ever forget it. Translations from the original German vary but the one I remember best is: “Gregor Samsa woke one morning after troubled dreams to find he had been transformed into a giant beetle.” Thus begins one of modern literature’s most horrifying, amusing and striking short stories.

Read the full article here (http://writinghood.com/online-writing/worlds-best-short-stories-metamorphosis/).

Poems of Rilke: The Swan

 

In his characteristically short and deceptively simple poem The Swan, Rainer Maria Rilke describes the waddling, ungainly swan and its transformation. There are several images and ideas that are likely to come into the reader’s mind as soon as the swan is mentioned: the first is the legend of Leda and the Swan, when the former maiden was sexually assaulted by the great god Zeus in the form of a large swan.

Read the full article here.