The Poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke: "I want to be with those who know secret things or else alone"

René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke, but better known as Rainer Maria Rilke, was born in Prague, then the capital of Bohemia and itself part of the Austro-Hungarian empire on 4th December 1875.

His mother treated Rilke for much of his early years as the daughter she had previously lost, even going so far as to dress him in girls clothing.

Rilke, initially pressured into attending a military school would however grow up to become a widely admired poet and writer. The intensity of his l...