the poet and mystic, Rainer Maria Rilke, to a nineteen-year-old cadet and aspiring poet named Franz Xaver Kappus, has touched millions of readers since it was first published in English in 1934. The translator, Mary Dows Herter Norton--a polymath extraordinaire with expertise in music, literature, and science, and who, along with her husband, William Warder Norton, founded the company that bears his name--played a crucial role in elevating Rilke's reputation in the English-speaking world.

This Norton Centenary Edition commemorates Norton, known as "Polly" to friends and colleagues, and the 100th anniversary of the publishing company she co-founded. An admiring foreword by Damion Searls--himself a recent translator of Rilke's Letters--celebrates Polly's stylistic achievement, and an afterword by Norton's President, Julia A. Reidhead, honors her commitment to maintaining W. W. Norton & Company's independence.

This handsome new edition of a beloved classic brings Rilke's enduring wisdom about life, love, and art to a new generation, in the translation that first introduced him to the English-speaking world.