LiederNet logo
Reprint Basket
×
  • Home | Introduction
  • Search the Site
  • Composers (21,233)
  • Text Authors (21,400)
  • Go to a Random Text
  • What’s New
  • A Small Tour
  • FAQ & Links
  • Donors
  • DONATE

CREDITS

  • Emily Ezust
  • Contributors (1,137)
  • Contact Information
  • Bibliography

  • Copyright Statement
  • Privacy Policy

Follow us on Facebook

by Victor Hugo (1802 - 1885)
Translation by Anonymous / Unidentified Author

Be Like the Bird
Language: English  after the French (Français) 
Be like the bird
That pausing in her flight
Awhile on boughs too slight,
Feels them give way
Beneath her and sings,
Knowing she hath wings.

Text Authorship:

  • by Anonymous / Unidentified Author [an adaptation] [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]

Based on:

  • a text in French (Français) by Victor Hugo (1802 - 1885), no title, written 1834, appears in Les Chants du Crépuscule, in 33. Dans l’église de *** , no. 6
    • Go to the text page.

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

  • by Abbie Betinis (b. 1980), "Be Like the Bird", first performed 2009 [ voices ]
        Score: Scribd [external link]
        Publisher: Abbie Betinis [external link]  [sung text not yet checked]

Settings in other languages, adaptations, or excerpts:

  • Also set in English, a translation by Theophilus Julius Henry Marzials (1850 - 1920) ; composed by Arthur Goring Thomas.
    • Go to the text. [Note: the text is not in the database yet.]

Researcher for this page: Joost van der Linden [Guest Editor]

This text was added to the website: 2026-10-13
Line count: 6
Word count: 26

Gentle Reminder

This website began in 1995 as a personal project by Emily Ezust, who has been working on it full-time without a salary since 2008. Our research has never had any government or institutional funding, so if you found the information here useful, please consider making a donation. Your help is greatly appreciated!
–Emily Ezust, Founder

Donate

We use cookies for internal analytics and to earn much-needed advertising revenue. (Did you know you can help support us by turning off ad-blockers?) To learn more, see our Privacy Policy. To learn how to opt out of cookies, please visit this site.

I acknowledge the use of cookies

Contact
Copyright
Privacy

Copyright © 2026 The LiederNet Archive

Site redesign by Shawn Thuris