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The first-ever English translation of Rilke's landmark poetry cycle, by Vita and Edward Sackville-West - reissued for the first time in 90 years In 1931, Virginia and Leonard Woolf's Hogarth Press published a small run of a beautiful edition of Rainer Maria Rilke's
Duino Elegies, in English translation by the writers Vita and Edward Sackville-West. This marked the English debut of Rilke's masterpiece, which would eventually be rendered in English over 20 times, influencing countless poets, musicians and artists across the English-speaking world.
Published for the first time in 90 years, the Sackville-Wests' translation is both a fascinating historical document and a magnificent blank-verse rendering of Rilke's poetry cycle. Featuring a new introduction from critic Lesley Chamberlain, this reissue casts one of European literature's great masterpieces in fresh light.
About the author
RAINER MARIA RILKE (1875 - 1926) is considered one of the greatest German-language writers to have ever lived. He is best known for his Duino Elegies, Sonnets to Orpheus and The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge.VITA SACKVILLE-WEST (1892-1962) was an English novelist, poet and garden designer. Born to an aristocratic family in the Kent countryside, she became a prolific and succesful author, publishing many novels and a dozen volumes of poetry.Lesley Chamberlain is a British writer and critic who has written extensively on German and Russian literature and published three novels. Her books include The Philosophy Steamer: Lenin and the Exile of the Intelligentsia, The Secret Artist: A Close Reading of Sigmund Freud and Motherland: a Philosophical History of Russia. Nietzsche in Turin is also available from Pushkin Press.EDWARD SACKVILLE-WEST (1901-65) was an English novelist and music critic who, in his later years, became a member of the House of Lords. He wrote several well-received books and won the James Tait Black Memoiral Prize.
