Morning in the Caucasus | Day is breaking -- the nocturnal mist is a wild shroud twisting

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by Mikhail Yur'yevich Lermontov (1814 - 1841)

Translation © by Dann Mitton

Утро на Кавказе

Language: Russian (Русский)

Our translations: ENG FRE

Светает - вьётся дикой пеленой
Вокруг лесистых гор туман ночной;
[Ещё у]¹ ног Кавказа тишина;
Молчит табун, река журчит одна.
Вот на скале новорожденный луч
Зарделся вдруг, прорезавшись меж туч,
И розовый по речке и шатрам
Разлился блеск и светит там и там:
Так девушки, купаяся в тени,
Когда увидят юношу они,
Краснеют все, к земле склоняют взор:
Но как бежать, коль близок милый вор!...

Available sung texts: (what is this?)

• D. Shostakovich

View original text (without footnotes)
¹ Shostakovich: "У" ("U")

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Note on Transliterations

Text Authorship:

by Mikhail Yur'yevich Lermontov (1814 - 1841), "Утро на Кавказе", written 1830 [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 Konstantin Yeremeyevich Matsyutin (1910 - 1990), "Утро на Кавказе" [sung text not yet checked]
by Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich (1906 - 1975), "Утро на Кавказе", op. 84 (Два романса на слова Ю. Лермонтова (Dva romansa na slova M. Yu. Lermontova) = Two romances on words by Lermontov) no. 1 [sung text checked 1 time]

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

ENG English (Dann Mitton) , "Morning in the Caucasus", copyright © 2013, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
FRE French (Français) (Guy Laffaille) , "Un matin dans le Caucase", copyright © 2009, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 12
Word count: 65

Morning in the Caucasus

Language: English after the Russian (Русский)

Day is breaking -- the nocturnal mist is a wild shroud twisting
around the woodsy hills;
There is stillness at the foot of the Caucasus;
The horses remain in silence, the river alone babbles.
There upon the face of the cliff a new-born ray
reddens suddenly, cutting between the storm-clouds
and casts its pinkness over the little river and the tents
Its splendour has overflowed everywhere:
And likewise, so it is, that maidens bathing in the shadows,
once they see the adolescent
they blush from head to toe and cast their gaze down to the ground;
Still, how can they flee if the sweet thief is so very near?

Text Authorship:

Translation from Russian (Русский) to English copyright © 2013 by Dann Mitton, (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 Russian (Русский) by Mikhail Yur'yevich Lermontov (1814 - 1841), "Утро на Кавказе", written 1830
- Go to the text page.

This text was added to the website: 2013-03-04
Line count: 12
Word count: 108