Letter to a Young Poet and Poems

"Letters To A Young Poet" by Rainer Maria Rilke is a prosaic work, but it refers directly to poetry. There are ten letters written to a young man about to enter the German military. In the very beginning of the 1903, Rilke received a letter from a twenty-year old lieutenant of Austro-Hungarian army Franz Kappus. Verses were enclosed to the letter: the lieutenant turned out to be a poet. Rilke answered. Rilke wrote Franz Kappus ten letters; the last of them is dated by December 1908. After Rilke's death, the letters were published in a separate book entitled "Letters To A Young Poet". Of all Rilke's extensive correspondence, these letters won the greatest popularity. It is explained by their content: there is nothing personal or private in them; Rilke wrote about the poetry, nature of poetic works, irony, loneliness, love etc. His philosophy-aesthetic views of that time are well reflected in these letters.