The Book of Hours was largely developed at the artist’s colony at Worpswede, but finished in Paris. It displays the turn towards mystical religiosity that was developing in the poet, in contrast to the naturalism popular at the time, after the religious inspiration he experienced in Russia. Soon thereafter, however, Rilke developed a highly practical approach to writing, encouraged by Rodin’s emphasis on objective observation. This rejuvenated inspiration resulted in a profound transformation of style, from the subjective and mystical incantations to his famous Ding-Gedichte, or thing-poems, that were published in the New Poems.

The Miletus torso (c. 480–470 BC) at the Louvre has been suggested as the poem's subject. "Archaic Torso of Apollo" (German: Archaïscher Torso Apollos) is a sonnet by the Austrian writer Rainer Maria Rilke, published in the collection New Poems in 1908. It opens the collection's second part and is a companion piece to "Early Apollo", which opens the first part. The poem describes the impressions given by the surviving torso of an archaic statue, which for the poet creates a vision of what the intact statue must have been like.