Throughout his life, Rilke looked to the spiritual and mythological traditions of the world for inspiration in his own search for God. Discouraged by his mother's dogmatic Catholicism, Rilke turned to esotericism and anthroposophy at an early age.

In turn-of-the-century Munich, he lived in close proximity to people seeking to understand life, such as Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky, and Rudolf Steiner, all of whom were on the search for an alternative to Christian forms of belief. His travels through Spain, Italy, North Africa, Egypt, and Russia also introduced him to other religions and mythologies.

Rilke sought the "divine" not in distant transcendent heavens, but in the "here and now": in the magic of nature and in the aura of simple everyday things, which he succeeded in capturing in his incomparable style.