![]() ![]() Her relationship with Rilke lasted until 1900, in which she brought about much of his éducation sentimentale and acted almost as a mother to him. ![]() Salomé was in a celibate and open marriage, and was a remarkable woman: widely-traveled, highly intelligent, and fiercely independent, she had refused proposals from men ranging from intellectual Paul Rée to philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. ![]() It was studying in Munich in 1897 that Rilke met and fell in love with the 36-year-old woman of letters Lou Andreas-Salomé, who proved to be extremely influential on Rilke’s life. None of these early books has much in the way of the keen observation that was to mark his later works. He was already certain he would start a literary career: by 1895 he had published, at his own expense, one volume of love poetry in the style of poet Heinrich Heine, called Life and Songs (Leben und Lieder), and would publish two more shortly thereafter. From 1892 to 1895, he was tutored for the university entrance exam, which he passed, and spent a year studying literature, art history, and philosophy at Charles University in Prague. With the help of his uncle, who recognized the boy’s gifts, Rilke managed to secure a place at a German preparatory school, which he attended for only a year until he was expelled. The poetic and sensitive boy spent five unhappy years there, and he left in 1891 due to illness. In an effort to ensure the social standing his father had failed to achieve, the young Rilke was sent to a rigorous military academy in 1886, at the age of 10. ![]()
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