Pure Contradiction: Selected Poems

Rainer Maria Rilke's work spans the divide between turn-of-the-century Europe's decadence and its post First World War revolutionary modernism, always struggling to develop, to seek and reach beyond itself. This selection of poems from throughout Rilke's creative output is arranged chronologically, placing poems of similar themes and / or modes of expression close to one another, making bed-fellows of poems rarely seen together. Each poem is to a greater or lesser extent conscious of others. The aim is to illuminate the underlying themes which Rilke said he had arrived at very early in his life. In his powerful new translation, skilfully shaped into current English, Ian Crockatt succeeds in catching Rilke's blend of crafted sensuality and inward-focused spiritual searching, while his comprehensive introduction and notes to this selection are both informative and enlightening.