Between the
New Poems
of 1907 and 1908 and his death in 1926, Rainer Maria Rilke published only two major volumes of poetry—the
Duino Elegies
and the
Sonnets to Orpheus
, both in 1923. But during this period he was writing verse continually, often prolifically—in letters, in guest books, in presentation copies, and chiefly in the pocket-books he always carried with him. This body of uncollected work exceeds five hundred pieces: finished poems of great poise and brilliance, headlong statements that hurtle through their subjects, haunting "fragments," and short bursts that arc into the unpursuable. A remarkable number of them are among Rilke's finest poems.
Snow's selection of more than a hundred of these little-known works distills the best of the uncollected poetry while offering a wide enough choice to convey Rilke's variety and industry during the years he wrote them.
Uncollected Poems
will lead students, scholars, and other readers to a fresh—and more accurate—understanding of this great poet's life and work.