Young Rilke and his time

"Although Rainer Maria Rilke and his work have been much studied and written about over the past century - as befits the perhaps most important German-language poet of modern times - certain aspects of his early life and career have been neglected or are in need of a fresh look. Accordingly, this book investigates Rilke's life and career from adolescence until the verge of thirty." "While depending heavily on the evidence of the texts themselves, the present author allows himself to erect some edifices of conjecture. The young Rilke emerges as a dogged self-educator, and, for all his laments and insecurities and languorous poses, a figure of distinction, gifted with an almost preternatural verbal inventiveness and recondite energy."--BOOK JACKET.