Poetry for Students

Volume 19 33

childhood desires—a son for his mother, a daugh-

ter for her father—that developed into neurotic

symptoms in adulthood, Freud argued. Childhood

was also the subject of the bestselling children’s

book of all time, The Tale of Peter Rabbit, authored

by Beatrix Potter and published in 1902.

Rilke struggled financially during this time and

restlessly traveled throughout Europe, to Worp-

swede, Italy, Scandinavia, Germany, and back to

Paris, searching for a place that could accommo-

date both his need to write and his desire for au-

thenticity in human interactions.

Critical Overview

Although “Childhood” is a frequently anthologized

Rilke poem because of its accessibility and subject

matter, very little criticism has been written on it

orThe Book of Images. Edward Snow, who has

translated the volume in its entirety, claims in his

introduction that this is because of the collection’s

“scattered, hybrid quality, which makes generaliz-

ing about it so difficult.” The collection itself ap-

peared twice, once in 1902 and again in 1906, in a

much-expanded version. Although Snow notes that

many of the poems are rough and do not live up to

Rilke’s later work, he claims, “In the most brilliant

of the poems in The Book of Images... Rilke is

uncannily confident from the first.”

Writing on Rilke in European Writers, James

Rolleston points out the significance of the collec-

tion in Rilke’s development as an artist, noting that

it “illuminates the continuity of Rilke’s maturing

process.” Critic Frank Wood agrees. In his study

of Rilke’s poetry, Rainer Maria Rilke: The Ring of

Forms, Wood claims the collection marks a transi-

tional phase in Rilke’s poetry. Comparing The Book

of ImagestoThe Book of Hours, written around the

same time, Wood says, “[The Book of Images] con-

tains some... really superb poems.... we are at

least aware that a poet, and not a stylized monk, is

speaking.”

Criticism

Chris Semansky

Semansky’s essays and reviews appear regu-

larly in journals and newspapers. In this essay, Se-

mansky considers the tone of Rilke’s poem and its

relation to his other poems on childhood.

Rilke was obsessed with loss, with the pres-

ence of death in life. His writing is invariably dark,

sad, elegiac. Elegies are laments written for the

dead. However, Rilke’s mourning was not limited

to the dead. As someone who paid minute atten-

tion to the nuances of his own feelings, perceptions,

and changes, Rilke also mourned the loss(es) of his

Childhood

Compare

&

Contrast

• 1900–1910:In 1900, Freud publishes The In-
  terpretation of Dreams, which attempts to ex-
  plain phenomena such as sexuality and abnormal
  desires.
  Today:Freud remains popular, though many of
  his theories have been discredited.


• 1900–1910:The December 1900 issue of the
  Ladies’ Home Journalpredicts that exercise will
  become compulsory in schools and that by the
  year 2000 those who cannot walk ten miles a
  day will be considered weaklings.

Today:Obesity is a major health problem in

both Western Europe and the Untied States, as

people eat more and exercise less.

• 1900–1910: German philosopher Friedrich
  Nietzsche, who proclaimed “God is dead” and
  whose ideas influenced Hitler, dies.
  Today:Nietzsche’s ideas continue to influence
  philosophers and social theorists throughout the
  world.

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