Chapter 12 12. The Tenth Letter

Dear Mr. Kappus, you should know how happy I am to have this beautiful letter from you.The news you gave me is true, sincere, and like you used to be, I think it's very good, the more I think about it, the more I feel that it is really good news.I would have liked to write to you on Christmas evening, but I have been working so many uninterrupted winters, and the ancient holiday is coming so fast, that I have no time for what I have to do, and more Write less. But I often think of you at festivals, and imagine how you lived in silence in your solitary fortress, surrounded by high, empty mountains, which the wind from the south seemed to swallow whole.

This kind of silence must be vast and boundless, so as to allow such wind and wind to gallop. If I think that even the vast sea is playing in front of you at the same time, like the deepest melody in the ancient homophony, then I hope You can faithfully and patiently allow this massive loneliness to work in you, and it can no longer be extinguished from your life; A nameless force, and will affect you exactly, as the blood of our ancestors flows continually through us, mingling with our own blood into one and only oneness, at whatever turn of our lives. Yes: I am very glad that you have this fixed and talkable existence, with titles, uniforms, tasks, everything that can be controlled and bounded, which are also isolated and few in number. In the military environment, the acceptance of serious and necessary work which transcends the games and pastimes of the military profession implies a vigilant exercise which not only allows but precisely develops autonomous attention.This is all that is necessary for us to live in situations that work for us and place us constantly in the presence of great and natural things.

Art is also a way of life for which, however we live, we unconsciously prepare for it; and every real life is closer to art than those false, art-calling professions, which flaunt an approximation The art of art actually negates and damages the existence of art, just like the entire newspaper writing, almost all critical circles, and three-quarters of the works that claim to be literature and want to be called literature.I am glad, shortly, because you have endured the perils you are prone to, and lived alone and bravely in the harsh reality of any place. The coming year will make you more determined in such a life.

Yours: Rene Maria Rilke 1908, The Second Day of Christmas; Paris