The Love and Death of Cornet Christopher Rilke
| Author | Rainer Maria Rilke |
|---|---|
| Original title | Die Weise von Liebe und Tod des Cornets Christoph Rilke |
| Translator | M. D. Herter Norton |
| Country | Austria-Hungary |
| Language | German |
| Genre | Prose Poem |
| Publisher | Insel Verlag |
Publication date | 1912 |
The Love and Death of Cornet Christopher Rilke is a prose poem written by Rainer Maria Rilke in 1899, revised in 1906, and published in 1912. Rilke wrote the poem after finding a document in his uncle Jaroslav's papers concerning Christopher Rilke, a man who Rainer's family erroneously[1] believed to be an ancestor and who "died as a cornet in the baron of Pirovano's company of the Imperial Austrian Heyster Regiment of Horse." [2] The poem recounts the adventures of Christopher Rilke, who travels with a company of soldiers and then, after a night in a castle with a lover, fights and dies in a war in Turkey and is mourned by an old woman.
Cornet was a tremendous success for Rilke, selling 5,000 copies in three weeks and leading to another print run of 20,000.[3] The success of Cornet surprised Rilke.[1] He came to believe that it was an inferior work, but it stayed in publication throughout his lifetime.[1] While Rilke and others have questioned its quality, Judith Ryan calls it a "key text for understanding Rilke's professional development.".[1]
In March 1919, Kurt Weill performed a symphonic version of the poem in Berlin.[4]
References
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German Wikisource has original text related to this article: |
- 1 2 3 4 Judith Ryan (25 November 1999). Rilke, Modernism and Poetic Tradition. Cambridge University Press. pp. 33–. ISBN 978-1-139-42666-4.
- ↑ Rilke, Rainer Marie trans. M.D. Herter Norton (1932). The Tale of the Love and Death of Cornet Christopher Rilke (1st ed.). WW Norton. p. 9.
- ↑ Wydenbruck, Nora (1950). Rilke: Man and Poet. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts. p. 16.
- ↑ Jurgen Schebera (1997). Kurt Weill: An Illustrated Life. Yale University Press. pp. 19–20. ISBN 978-0-300-07284-6.