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"On the centennial of the first appearance (1923) of Rilke's Sonnets to Orpheus, award-winning translator Mark Burrows reveals their depth and meaning with a brilliant new introduction and translation. This new translation captures the lyric beauty of Rilke's poems, honoring their syntactic peculiarities and grammatical complexities as few translators have dared to do. Burrows' versions maintain the essential strangeness of language and abruptness of metaphor by which the sonnets attain their distinctive character in German. Burrows' approach replicates what one reviewer describes as the poems' "dazzling obscurity," refusing to resolve the deliberate difficulties Rilke's formulations present. The effect invites readers to linger with these sonnets, allowing themselves to be shaped in their encounter with them"--
List of contents
Introduction: “We Make the World Our Own”
The Sonnets to Orpheus
Part I
Part II
An excerpt from Rilke’s Letter on the Sonnets to Witold von Hulewicz
The Ninth Duino Elegy
Acknowledgments
About the author
Mark S. Burrows is a Rilke scholar, award-winning translator, and poet, and his academic and popular writing explores the intersection of spirituality and the arts. A winner of the Witter Bynner Prize in Poetry, his poems have appeared in journals and anthologies in the US and abroad. Known internationally for his work on Rilke, he is the translator of Rilke’s
Prayers of a Young Poet, which includes many of Rilke’s best-loved poems that later appeared in
The Book of Hours. He has also co-authored three volumes of poems inspired by Meister Eckhart, most recently
Meister Eckhart’s Book of Darkness and Light. www.soul-in-sight.org
Summary
“Rilke's voice from the last tumultuous young century reaches tenderly into ours. But his lush German is a language of its own. Mark Burrows has a rare gift to coax it faithfully into English. I am delighted, and so very grateful for this book.” —Krista Tippett, host of “On Being”
On the centennial of the first appearance (1923) of Rilke’s Sonnets to Orpheus, award-winning translator Mark Burrows reveals their depth and meaning with a brilliant new introduction and translation.
This new translation captures the lyric beauty of Rilke's poems, honoring their syntactic peculiarities and grammatical complexities as few translators have dared to do. Burrows’ versions maintain the essential strangeness of language and abruptness of metaphor by which the sonnets attain their distinctive character in German. Burrows' approach replicates what one reviewer describes as the poems’ “dazzling obscurity,” refusing to resolve the deliberate difficulties Rilke’s formulations present. The effect invites readers to linger with these sonnets, allowing themselves to be shaped in their encounter with them.
Foreword
- We will launch with a Facebook Live event, perhaps in conversation with Pádraig Ó Tuama, poet and host of Poetry Unbound.
- Strong social media campaign, centering around events/lectures at the locations identified above.
- Extended galley mailing to poetry, literary, spiritual sites and podcasts.
- Goodreads giveaway.
- IndieBound Advance Access.
- Special outreach to Rilke-affiliated associations and societies in the U.S.
