In 1902, the young German writer Rainer Maria Rilke travelled to Paris to write a monograph on the sculptor Auguste Rodin. He returned to the city many times over the course of his life, by turns inspired and appalled by the high culture and low society. Paris was a lifelong source of inspiration for Rilke. Perhaps most significantly, the letters he wrote about it formed the basis of his prose masterpiece, The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge. This volume brings together a new translation of Rilke’s essay on poetry, Notes on the Melody of Things, and the first English translation of Rilke’s experiences in Paris as observed by his French translator, Maurice Betz.