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From the book “The Consolation of Objects“:

The following verses, which begin Rainer Maria Rilke’s (1875–1926) Duino Elegies, are one of the starting points for my lyrical, politically tinged novel The New Life:

“Who, if I cried out,
would hear me among the Angelic Orders?”

In my novel, I grappled with what Rilke probably meant when he said that the angels in his elegies had more in common with the angelic figures of Islam. In the thirty years since the novel’s publication, this question has also been discussed by numerous literary scholars. Reference is often made to Rilke’s letters and to the fact that he read the Qur’an. In particular, the question is raised as to how exactly the angels of Christianity and Islam, which Rilke so carefully distinguished, differ from each other. The answer is sought in the Qur’an, in the Bible, in Rilke’s poems and letters—in other words, in nothing but texts.

In this box, I have rather tried to provide a visual answer.