Guest Marie Darrieussecq, author of more than 20 novels, discusses two of her non-fiction books *Sleepless: A Memoir of Insomnia* and *Being Here is Everything: The Life of Paula Modersohn-Becker*. She reads an excerpt of Rainier Maria Rilke's “Requiem for a Friend.” Recitation begins at 30:41 .

Rainier Maria Rilke: from “Requiem for a Friend”

And fruits: I will buy fruits; and in their sweetness
that country's earth and sky will live again.
For that is what you understood: ripe fruits.
You set them before the canvas, in white bowls,
and weighed out each one's fullness with your colors.
Women too, you saw, were fruits; and children, moulded
from inside, into the shapes of their existence.
And at last, you saw yourself as a fruit, you stepped
out of your clothes and brought your naked body
before the mirror, you let yourself inside
down to your gaze; which stayed in front, immense,
and didn't say, I am that; no: This is.