Rating: 
Summary: Interesting
Review: I was recommended this book by a Creative Writing teacher at NYU, because I myself am I young poet.The beginning has great advice to a young writer, don't write something and search for recognition, write because you have to write, write because you love it. The rest of the letters are interesting, mainly based on solidarity, and are worth a read. My life wasn't changed after reading this book, perhaps because I am already extremely introspective, but if it helps you expand your horizons, the more power to you! It's a nice read.
Rating: 
Summary: Poor translation of an even poorer book
Review: I've never understood the fascination with the "wisdom" of the 28 year old Rilke. To me, this is quite possibly the most condescending work in German literature.
Rating: 
Summary: Read it and Reread it
Review: If you have ever wanted to create /anything/, not just poetry (this book is not about writing poetry!), and have been faced with the overwhelming fear of failure: read this book If you ever are feeling alone, dejected, unsure of life: read this book. It contains one of the most beautiful and honest perspecitives on life that I have found in any book. Following Rilke's advice, though, may be impossible for you, but--here's to trying.
Rating:
Summary: more questions than answers
Review: In theory, I think this book is wonderful. It's the timeless story of a wise and worldly teacher sharing his wisdom with a young and innocent and admiring student, telling him to look within, to avoid love for now and seek solitude and personal reflection instead, to first study life in its tiniest and least significant forms in order to discover true beauty, etc. My shock with this book came AFTER reading it, when I discovered that Rilke HIMSELF was only 27 or 28 years old (!) when he started writing to the young poet. For me, his age did not jive with his tone, which was that of a 85 year old world-weary sage. It could be he really was wise beyond his years, but I can't help but have the suspicion that some arrogance on his part might be at play. And then, all his talk about the young poet not seeking love, not attempting love poems, not being able to understand love for some time yet - all wonderful and perhaps true advice...but Rilke himself had already married by 25 or 26, and was a father a year later. is he perhaps giving out the advice that he himself cannot take? Or seeing all his own unfulfilled (and perhaps denied) hopes for himself in the young and naive poet? All this said, I feel Rilke was a man far ahead of his time, and perhaps one who knew too much about himself and human nature to ever really find true happiness in the time in which he was living. It's just a sixth sense I get about him, and it may be off the mark, so I write this with some hesitancy - perhaps I'm wrong! In the meantime, I must learn more about the life of Rilke, otherwise this book shall lack a context for me...
Rating:
Summary: A must read if you want to be a writer
Review: Letters to a Young Poet has become a classic since it first appeared back in the 1930's. Most everyone knows what the book is and is about, so I won't bore you with lengthy explanations of such. Simply put - it is a collection of letters from Rilke to a poet that wrote asking Rilke to look at his poems and tell the youth what he thought of them. Every writer should read the first letter in the book. Every writer. It contains the most poignant statement he makes in all ten letters by far: "This above all - ask yourself in the stillest hour of the night: must I write? Delve into yourself for a deep answer. And if this should be affirmative, if you may meet this earnest question with a strong and simple 'I must,' then build your life according to this necessity..." This advice, given to one writer a century ago, is still one of the truest wisdoms all writers must adhere to. The other nine letters offer some other pearls of wisdom concerning writing and life - also a glimpse into the man that Rilke was. But they do not match the power and depth of that first letter, which I read and re-read every week. Committing it to memory. Must I write? I must.
Rating:
Summary: Who gave me this book and how it has inspired and helped me.
Review: Not long ago, my boyfriend (who is now my ex) gave this book to me. He suggested I read it. "It will improve the way you look at life," he said. Being that he was a poetry teacher; I said yes, opened my mind and began to read. With that said, I found the book to be the most inspiring I have ever read. The most inspiring letter was the fourth one. This letter touches me
most. It opened inside of me thoughts and feelings I did not know I had. This letter alone
explores everything from sex to Life to being a poet. His fourth letter, written from Worpswede, just shocked my system to the core. In it was everything I had questions about and nothing in the world was left out of it.
This whole book inspired me to begin writing poetry. I had never even thought of the idea before, but now I know it makes sense.
I knew as I read the book that this man was one of
few greats that we have in our history. He is not
widely known outside of the poetic circle, but should be. His works, especially Letters to a Young Poet, should be read by everyone.
This book forced me to look at Life as I never had
before. This new outlook gave my Life a direction. Now I am soon to publish my own poems
and I never would have started such a thing had it
not been for this book.
When you live your Life as you think the world would like, you tend to become close-minded. Not
on purpose and perhaps you still believe yourself
to be an open-minded person. I did. This book showed me that I was wrong, but that there was someone and something (Rilke and Letters to a Young Poet) that had answers my soul sought, but I
knew nothing about.
I read this book again and again and find things
hidden within it I had not seen before. Each of
these things opens my mind to an even brighter and
more vast universe.
Rating:
Summary: I guess everyone realized this but me...
Review: Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet (Norton, 1962) I should preface my judgment on this by saying that I've been misled for the past twenty years regarding this book, which I somehow never got around to reading until I was older than both of the principals therein (the young poet hasn't yet reached his twenties at the beginning of the correspondence; Rilke is twenty-eight). Norton's categorization of it as literature (instead of philosophy), and various rave reviews of it that concentrate on the fact that Rilke wrote these letters to a person who wrote him looking for help with his (the original writer's) poetry, led me to believe this small collection of essays had to do with poesy. No, they have to do with philosophy. Rilke informs his reader that he (Rilke) is unqualified to remark on craft and technique on the very first page, and does not do so for the rest of the book. So, in other words, I didn't get what I was expecting. The philosophy therein seems pretty dated forty years after that fact (and almost a century since the letters were actually written), but we didn't have an avalanche of self-help books in 1962, many of which were probably derived at least in part from Rilke's words, feeding us this endless stream of unbearable pap. The book can be summed up neatly in the words of a particularly memorable Monty Python song (I'm sure I don't have to mention which), but that's not something to hold against the book. Rilke was a thinker of the illigitimi non carborundum school of thought; while his prose does get a tad wordy in a few places, he generally sticks to the point, and his words are far more intelligent than those of what has come since. The Norton edition of 1962 also contains a mini-bio of Rilke centered around the time the letters were written, to give the reader background on the events in Rilke's life that were influencing his words. Nice addition that helps deepen the understanding of what he was on about. I just wish he'd been on about poetry. ***
Rating: 
Summary: Well-written but dangerous advice
Review: Rilke is a marvelous writer. And hats off to the translator. I enjoyed the cadence and style of this well-written, short book. My issue is with the advice that Rilke gives the young poet. he instructs the poet to go inside himself and study his solitude. He admits that this might cause him pain, but the student should then ponder upon the very meaning of the pain he feels. This, to me, as well as much other in this small volume, seemed to be bad advice. Rilke came off as a Hermit, and I kept thinking to myself "misery does love company, doesn't it?" If you are a social bug and have yet to spend any time pondering life's meaning, this book is for you. If you tend to be a recluse, beware. Rilke will have you crawling miserably around inside yourself for months. Go out and have coffee with a friend. Beauty can also be found in other people!
Rating:
Summary: Graceful and honest
Review: Rilke's letters to a young poet are deeply moving in their honesty and clarity. Responding to the corrospondence of a student of one of Rilke's former teachers, Rilke not only explains what it is to be a poet ("ask yourself in the most silent hour of the night: MUST I write? ... if you meet this solmn question with a strong, simple "I must," then build your life in accordance with this necessity;") but what it is to exist and experience life in the modern world. ("Don't search for answers now, because you would not be able to live them .. the point is, to live everything. LIVE the questions now.")
The power of Rilke's words are in their truth, but also in the beauty of their sentiments. This is one of my favorite books of all time for this reason, and I highly recommend it.
Rating:
Summary: timeless wisdom
Review: Ten letters Rilke wrote to an aspiring poet asking
for his help with becoming a poet.
Surprisingly for the reader and probably as well for
the recipient of said letters, Rilke doesn't go into
the poetry aspect at all, but clearly refuses to do
so right in the first letter.
Instead he treats the questions of what it means to
work on becoming a fully developped human being.
Giving timeless advice full of wisdom about solitude,
troubles, sorrows, love, human interaction and being
part of a society in which one doesn't seem to really fit
in. Wonderful advice, very often in the form of further questions
that Rilke seemed to have sent back in order to encourage
the recipient to go further in his quest of finding what
everything means (to him) and who one is. Wonderfully poetic advise to be shared and read and reread
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