“Madness is Somewhere Else”: A Marcusian Reading of Rainer Maria Rilke’s Sonnets to Orpheus

Year 2019, Volume: 9 Issue: 1, 79 - 92, 30.06.2019

Nina Cemiloğlu

Abstract

The aim of this article is to read Rainer Maria Rilke’s Sonnets to Orpheus (Sonette an Orpheus) from a Marcusian perspective. This article is divided into five parts: The first part focuses on the representation of Orpheus in Rilke’s sonnet cycle and on Marcuse’s interpretation of the myths of Prometheus, Orpheus and Narcissus. The second part draws attention to the notion of a new sensibility characterized by receptivity and nonviolence in Sonnets to Orpheus and Marcuse’s works. The third part explores Rilke’s and Marcuse’s views on narcissism. The fourth part points out affinities between Rilke’s sonnet cycle and Marcuse’s works with ecocritical ideas. The fifth part discusses the two writers’ ideas on the function of poetry in society. A final paragraph sums up the conclusions drawn in the previous five parts of this article.

Keywords

Rainer Maria Rilke, Herbert Marcuse, German 20 th -Century Poetry, Orpheus

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