LiederNet logo

CONTENTS

×
  • Home | Introduction
  • Composers (20,139)
  • Text Authors (19,552)
  • Go to a Random Text
  • What’s New
  • A Small Tour
  • FAQ & Links
  • Donors
  • DONATE

UTILITIES

  • Search Everything
  • Search by Surname
  • Search by Title or First Line
  • Search by Year
  • Search by Collection

CREDITS

  • Emily Ezust
  • Contributors (1,114)
  • Contact Information
  • Bibliography

  • Copyright Statement
  • Privacy Policy

Follow us on Facebook

×

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.

To inquire about permissions and rates, contact Emily Ezust at licenses@email.lieder.example.net

If you wish to reprint translations, please make sure you include the names of the translators in your email. They are below each translation.

Note: You must use the copyright symbol © when you reprint copyright-protected material.

by Pierre de Ronsard (1524 - 1585)
Translation © by David Wyatt

Qui voudra voir dedans une jeunesse
Language: French (Français) 
Our translations:  ENG
Qui voudra voir dedans une jeunesse
La beauté jointe avec la chasteté,
L'humble douceur, la grave majesté,
Toutes vertus et toute gentilesse;

Qui voudra voir les yeux d'une déesse
Et de nos ans la seule nouveauté,
De ceste dame oeillade la beauté,
Que le vulgaire appelle ma maistresse.

Il apprendra comme Amour rit et mord,
Comme il guarit, comme il donne la mort;
[Puis il dira, voyant chose si belle:

Heureux, vraiment, heureux qui peut avoir
Heureusement cet heur que de la voir,
Et plus heureux qui meurt pour l'amour d'elle!]1

View original text (without footnotes)
1 variant:
Puis il dira: Quelle estrange nouvelle!

Du ciel la terre empruntoit sa beauté;
La terre au ciel maintenant a osté
La beauté mesme, ayant chose si belle.

Text Authorship:

  • by Pierre de Ronsard (1524 - 1585), "Qui voudra voir dedans une jeunesse" [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 Anthoine de Bertrand (1540? - 1581?), "Qui voudra voir dedans une jeunesse", 1576, published 1578, first performed 1576 [ vocal quartet a cappella ], from Les Amours de Pierre de Ronsard à 4 parties, Livre 1, no. 7 [sung text not yet checked]

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

  • ENG English (David Wyatt) , "Whoever would like to see within one young lady", copyright © 2012, (re)printed on this website with kind permission


Researcher for this page: David Wyatt

This text was added to the website: 2012-07-25
Line count: 14
Word count: 92

Whoever would like to see within one young lady
Language: English  after the French (Français) 
Whoever would like to see within one young lady
Beauty joined with chastity,
Soft humility, grave majesty,
All virtues and all nobility:

Whoever would like to see the eyes of a goddess
And the only novelty of our times;
Let him cast his eye on the beauty of this lady
Whom the common folk call my mistress.

He will learn how love smiles and bites,
How it heals and how it gives death;
[Then he will say, seeing a thing so lovely:

Fortunate is he, fortunate indeed, who can have
Just this fortunate hour to see her,
And more fortunate he who dies for love of her!]1

View original text (without footnotes)
1 variant:
Then he will say: what a strange novelty!

From heaven, earth borrows its beauty;
But the earth now has taken from heaven
Beauty itself, having such a beautiful thing [upon it].

Text Authorship:

  • Translation from French (Français) to English copyright © 2012 by David Wyatt, (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 French (Français) by Pierre de Ronsard (1524 - 1585), "Qui voudra voir dedans une jeunesse"
    • Go to the text page.

 

This text was added to the website: 2012-07-25
Line count: 14
Word count: 108

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 © 2025 The LiederNet Archive

Site redesign by Shawn Thuris