I would like to thank the publisher and NetGalley for providing with an Advanced Reader Copy, in exchange for an honest review.

I've read Rilke's novel: "Letters to a young poet" and I found the collection lyrical and romantic, as the author advises a young poet. I expected to like this collection of poems by him but I found them too lyrical for my taste.
I think that they will be better appreciated by scholars and connoisseurs of this genre of poetry.

This just wasn't the book for me. It took me a while to read it because I just wasn't feeling it. I didn't really enjoy reading it, but I hope other people will. Rating: 2/5 stars.

Before reading this, I was unsure if any meaning or emotions of the poems would be lost in translation. However, the collection previewed a compelling experience from start to finish. I found myself often comparing the text to the sky as I read at night. I definitely recommend this book for versed poets and newcomers alike. It was a simple yet wonderful read, and serves as a gateway to reading other German poetry.

I think this work was intriguing, especially since Rilke’s work hadn’t be translated to English before, however, I felt like this book just fell flat for me. I wanted to like it, I just felt really detached and unmoved.

The writing style presented in this collection was brilliant. The execution and some of the subject matter fell short. While some of these were downright fun to read and enjoyable, others felt flat and just incomplete.

I was not able to complete this collection.

The introduction was great and really caught my eye but the poems themselves I found were not really presenting the emotion that they were meant.

Before this, I'd never read any collections of Rilke's work. I'd seen poems one at a time and always enjoyed them. In this collection, we get a chance to read a number of her translated poems all at once.

In 1916, Rainer Maria Rilke presented the writer Rudolf Kassner with a notebook, containing twenty-two poems, meticulously copied out in his own hand, which bore the title "Poems to Night."
These have never before translated into English, this collection brings together all Rilke's significant night poems in one volume.

This work is beautiful and heartbreaking and touching. You can read this over time or all in one sitting and get something from it.

A beautifully written poem in its first English translation by Rainer Maria Rilke.

Not only does this contain the full work by Rainer, it is also rich in the history of the poet and the things that he was experiencing while writing this beautiful piece over the time of January 1913-February1914. It also contains a few more of the poets works that also associate with the night theme. If you enjoy poetry casually, like myself, this is a great read. Or if you are avid in the literary arts, this is also a great read, as it is full of rich history and the first ever English translation of this beautiful work.

Rainer Maria Rilke was born in Prague in 1875. He attended university in Prague and in Munich, switching majors from art history, literature and philosophy to political science, law and Darwinian theory. He published his first collection of poems in 1894. He suffered from a wonderful illness called “Fernweh” - he loved travelling. He crisscrossed the old world – from Germany to Russia and then to Spain, and from Italy to Egypt. The Great war meant that he had to join the war, and he did that as a clerk in the war archives in Vienna. During war, in 1916, Rilke gave a notebook of his poems revolving around night to his friend Rudolf Kassner. Rilke died of leukaemia in 1927, refusing all treatment and wanting to die “his own death.”

The collection “Poems to Night” offers all 22 poems from the notebook given to Kassner, but also includes sketches for poems and other completed poems with the same topic – the night.

Rilke here offers a collection of morsels for the soul. He doesn’t bother the reader with long verses, with complicated rhymes, with washed out epithets. He just gives the reader an insight into the connection a person has with their constant companion.

We have all felt the emotions he describes here, but, not being poets, we were unable to put them into words. Rilke then serves as a translator for those indescribable feelings.

He talks about love and our constant search for that something that keeps slipping from our grasp. We carry our thoughts and yearnings with us and we look for someone to offer them to, but sadly we carry them
…to the stranger, who misunderstood us,
alas to the other, whom we never found…

But even when we are feeling down and defeated, the night brings us recuperation, it sooths us and makes us stronger
When through the olive trees’ pale separation
the night made me stronger with stars…

We want to be seen and in the night, it seems like millions of stars are looking down on us, seeing us, “surveying us.” The night gives us courage to face being seen.

This whole collection of poems is the kind of book one should keep on one’s nightstand and turn to when the traffic din is down and all you can see through your window are the moon and the stars.

A wonderful book, a wonderful poet.

I received an advance copy of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The imagery is beautiful in the book. Probably most recommended for fans of the writer though but wasn't for me.

This felt like coming home, made me long for the warm nights of summer where it wraps around me like an old friend. This collection of RIlke's poems are beautiful, but I found myself falling in love with the draft's from this collection.
I found so many lines that felt like they were in harmony with my own soul.

I wanted to like it and pretend I'm super fancy and get this sort of poetry but honestly this was really bad. Maybe the original writing great and really means something and it's just the translation that absolutely ridiculous (maybe some things aren't meant to be translated).

The introduction was boring, heavy, and bored me so thoroughly that I almost went to sleep and I have insomnia people; that isn't easy to do. Had they brought the intro at the end to give some sort of context that would have worked better. When I was reading "If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho" translated by Anne Carson I read every footnote and explanation at the end, and then I went back to read the poetry. It's just this was not worth reading and the introduction was where that started.

One reviewer on NetGalley called this "interminable dross" and that is absolutely the best way to describe this book.

I'm not terribly familiar with Rilke's work, but I enjoyed this collection focused on night, nature, and introspection. The introduction was a bit affected; in retrospect, I wish I had jumped past it to read the poems and interpret them for myself. It was also interesting to see some of Rilke's unfinished poetry toward the end of the collection.

I received an advance copy of this book through NetGalley I’m exchange for an honest review.

Poems to Night is an interesting collection of Rilke’s poetry translated into English for the first time by Will Stone. The poems explore the relationship between humans and the night, which here often stands for the eternal and divine, at a time of many scientific advances and heavy industry.

Some of the poems spoke to me and some did not. Rilke’s imagery is beautiful, as is the sense of place found in the collection. I did feel like the poems blurred into one another somewhat, but that may be because I read the collection quite quickly.

I’d recommend this collection to fans of the poet and those interested in the themes described, though probably not to a wider audience.

I wanted to read Rilke's poems for a while and that book was the perfect chance. I really enjoyed it. I loved the night theme and it fits perfectly for what he wrote. I felt the loneliness and melancholy through his poems. Rilke's poetry was really gorgeous and I'll continue to read more of his poems in the future.

I have all the appreciation and respect for the editor of this book. However, the poetry did nothing for me. It felt dull and lifeless. Totally a miss for me.

I would like to thank Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC of this poetry collection. This is my honest review.

I haven't read any of the works of Rainer Maria Rilke prior to this, but his name was one I was familiar with, and I had been meaning to get to him. I am glad that this little volume helped me to do so. His poetry is beautiful, and I enjoyed how the focus of this collection was on the night.

I think that given the year we have had, there are certain feelings relayed in these poems that we can relate to today, those of isolation and loneliness. These are the things that the mind can grapple with at night before you drift off to sleep.

That being said, there are two other large sections in the book that I feel overshadow his poetry. One is an introduction that gives copious information about the poems, and the other is a section that contains information about the poet. I feel that the weight of these sections detracted from the poetry itself and was a lot to wade through. I would have liked for there to be less to the introduction so the reader could have their own thoughts about the collection without being frontloaded.

I’m quite disappointed by this reading. The poems didn’t make me feel a thing and the wording felt awkward and confusing at times. It could be the translation or simply the original vocabulary, Anyway, I expected to like this more.

I really wanted to like this collection, but I didn’t enjoy it much. I think this is one of those books where you either love it or you don’t. Many of the poems were descriptive which is great. Other than that, the collection didn’t grab my attention like I thought it would.

Poems to Night is a collection of Rainer Maria Rilke's work well worth considering, enjoying, and sharing with others. Rilke is masterful and these poems are evidence a great talent. An ideal gift for poetry lovers.