Attention! Some of this material is not in the public domain.
It is illegal to copy and distribute our copyright-protected material without permission. It is also illegal to reprint copyright texts or translations without the name of the author or translator.
If you wish to reprint translations, please use the Reprint Basket (upper right hand corner).
Reminder: You must always use the copyright symbol © when you reprint copyright-protected material.
Against my love shall be as I am now,
With Time's injurious hand crush'd and o'erworn;
When hours have drain'd his blood and fill'd his brow
With lines and wrinkles; when his youthful morn
Hath travell'd on to age's steepy night;
And all those beauties whereof now he's king
Are vanishing, or vanished out of sight,
Stealing away the treasure of his spring;
For such a time do I now fortify
Against confounding age's cruel knife,
That he shall never cut from memory
My sweet love's beauty, though my lover's life:
His beauty shall in these black lines be seen,
And they shall live, and he in them still green.
About the headline (FAQ)
Text Authorship:
- by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), no title, appears in Sonnets, no. 63 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):
- by Richard Simpson (1820 - 1876), "Sonnet LXIII", 1865, published [1878] [ voice and piano ], in Sonnets of Shakespeare, Selected from a complete Setting and Miscellaneous Songs, ed. Natalie Macfarren, London : Stanley Lucas, Weber [sung text not yet checked]
Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- FRE French (Français) (François-Victor Hugo) , no title, appears in Sonnets de Shakespeare, no. 63, first published 1857
- ITA Italian (Italiano) (Ferdinando Albeggiani) , copyright © 2025, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
This text was added to the website: 2010-08-12
Line count: 14
Word count: 110
Quando l’amor mio si ridurrà simile a come sono ora, dalla mano ingiuriosa del tempo schiacciato e logorato; Quando si prosciugherà il suo sangue d’ora in ora e il suo sembiante da solchi intensi sarà segnato, quando il suo mattino, con tutto il suo splendore avrà viaggiato verso la notte profonda dell’età; e ogni bellezza di cui ora è il signore starà svanendo, o dalla vista sparirà, rubando il tesoro della sua primavera; Per quel tempo mi fortifico ora contro la lama crudele dell’età, che mai potrà tagliare la mia memoria. E pur se la lama ne taglierà la vita La bellezza del mio amore in eterno mostreranno queste mie linee nere, che con lui rinverdiranno.
About the headline (FAQ)
Text Authorship:
- Translation from English to Italian (Italiano) copyright © 2025 by Ferdinando Albeggiani, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you may ask the copyright-holder(s) directly or ask us; we are authorized to grant permission on their behalf. Please provide the translator's name when contacting us.
Contact: licenses@email.lieder.example.net
Based on:
- a text in English by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), no title, appears in Sonnets, no. 63
This text was added to the website: 2025-07-17
Line count: 15
Word count: 116