The Sound of Alienation: Rainer Maria Rilke’s “The Voices”

In the nine “Voices” poems (“Die Stemmen,” 1902), we find Rilke speaking out for those who have suffered pain and injustice. He insists that in order for them to be heard, they need to “advertise” themselves, and this should be done through singing, or songs – like the castrati (referred to as “these cut ones”) who sing to God and compel him to stay and listen. This message is found in the “Title Leaf” – an introduction of sorts to the nine songs.

It is tempting to read the nine songs (“Beggar’s,” “Blind Man’s,” “Drunkard’s,” “Suicide’s,” “Widow’s,” “Idiot’s,” “Orphan Girl’s,” “Dwarf’s,” “Leper’s”) as a collection of poetic pleas for social awareness. This is due to Rilke’s “casting choices”; he has selected society’s most conspicuous outcasts as the main speakers of his poems. When, for instance, the beggar in “The Beggar’s Song” says, “I go always from door to door/rain-soaked and sun-scorched,” we are induced to sympathise with his downtrodden fate. The same can be said for the rest of the “cast.”

Yet, a sociological reading of the nine poems may not in itself be complete. The fates of the nine speakers may tell us of their disadvantaged positions in society, but their voices in fact tell a somewhat more abstract story: that each and every one of these sufferers is a part of the Modern Man, and that the Modern Man is a vessel of the darkness they live with every day. The notion of alienation and desolation is inseparable from life in the 20^th century, and Rilke’s poems, in particular these “Voices” poems, confront us with our own pain, loneliness and isolation.

The topics of the nine songs can be roughly broken down as such:

“The Beggar’s Song”:  Hidden and unacknowledged pain; the shame of suffering; the need to disguise that shame.

“The Blind Man’s Song”: Anger at being deprived; hidden pain; the inability to relate to others; the feeling of not being understood; envy.

“The Drunkard’s Song”: The difficulty of remaining sober/rational; the guilt that comes from not being in control of oneself; self-hatred; self-destruction.  

“The Suicide’s Song”: Disillusionment with a life which sickens; the need to cease living.

“The Widow’s Song”: The realisation that life is ephemeral, and that we possess nothing; every road leads to Death.

“The Idiot’s Song” The inability to “read” the world; existing in blissful ignorance (and yet sensing there is danger “out there”); the inability to understand the concept of God the Creator.

“The Orphan Girl’s Song”: Abandonment; insignificance of existence; a life of desolation and lovelessness, which may or may not find its reward in “God’s light.”

“The Dwarf’s Song”: The ugliness of being; why does God create ugliness?; what is God the Creator’s motive?

“The Leper’s Song”: Abandonment; banishment; extreme alienation; the ugliness of being.

A cursory look at all the themes listed above will tell us that “The Voices” are the inner voices of the Modern Man who finds himself grappling with alienation in a world that is becoming increasingly crude and impersonal. The 20^th century was a tumultuous century of two devastating world wars and innumerable massacres and genocides – gruesome, inhumane events that forced the Modern Man to re-assess the existing morals, social mores, and religious/philosophical thoughts, which inevitably led to the destruction of conventional beliefs and faith in God. Rilke’s poems presciently foreshadowed the horror and hopelessness that was going to characterise the 20^th century. But what truly makes the poems essential reading is the fact that they are not products of their time. They concern instead the precariousness of the human condition – a timeless phenomenon that all human beings possessing a certain level of intellect could effortlessly relate to.

The poems referred to are found in The Poetry of Rilke (translated and edited by Edward Snow), published by North Point Press in 2009.