Fünf Lieder auf Gedichte von Emily Dickinson für Sopran, Bratsche, Mandoline und Gitarre

Translations © by Bertram Kottmann

by David Horowicz (b. 1960)

View original-language texts alone: Five songs on poems of Emily Dickinson

1. I'm nobody! Who are you?  [sung text not yet checked]
Language: English 
I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us - don't tell!
They'd [banish us]1, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell [your]2 name the livelong [day]3
To an admiring bog!

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1 Bacon, G. Coates: "advertise"
2 Bacon, G. Coates: "one's"
3 Bacon, G. Coates: "June"

by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886)
1.
Language: German (Deutsch) 
Bin ein Niemand! Wer bist du?
Bist auch ein Niemand du?
Dann sind zu zweit wir - sag’s niemand!
Wir würden dann verbannt.

Wie monoton, jemand zu sein -
ein lauter Frosch gleichsam:
Der stellt sich vor, tagaus, tagein
Bewunderern im Schlamm!

Text Authorship:

  • Translation from English to German (Deutsch) copyright © 2016 by Bertram Kottmann, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you must ask the copyright-holder(s) directly for permission. If you receive no response, you must consider it a refusal.

    Bertram Kottmann.  Contact: BKottmann (AT) t-online.de

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This text was added to the website: 2016-03-06
Line count: 8
Word count: 40

Translation © by Bertram Kottmann
2. Much madness is divinest sense  [sung text not yet checked]
Language: English 
Much madness is divinest sense
To [a]1 discerning eye;
Much sense the starkest madness.
'Tis the majority
In this, as all, prevails.
Assent, and you are sane,
Demur, - you're straightaway dangerous,
And handled with a chain.

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1 Langert : "the"

by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886)
2.
Language: German (Deutsch) 
„Verrücktheit“ - göttlichste Vernunft -
dem, der es wahrlich sieht,
„Vernunft“, schierste Verrücktheit -
doch was die Mehrheit meint,
das gilt, wie stets, auch hier -
wer zustimmt, ist normal,
und wer sich sträubt, gilt als Gefahr,
die man in Ketten legt.

Text Authorship:

  • Translation from English to German (Deutsch) copyright © 2017 by Bertram Kottmann, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you must ask the copyright-holder(s) directly for permission. If you receive no response, you must consider it a refusal.

    Bertram Kottmann.  Contact: BKottmann (AT) t-online.de

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This text was added to the website: 2017-06-10
Line count: 8
Word count: 38

Translation © by Bertram Kottmann
3. Tell all the Truth but tell it slant   [sung text not yet checked]
Language: English 
Tell all the Truth but tell it slant -
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth's superb surprise

As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind -

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by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886)
3.
Language: German (Deutsch) 
Künd’ Wahrheit ganz, doch sag’s verquer:
Erfolg verspricht umkreisen!
Kommt sie zu unverblümt daher,
wir uns zu schwach erweisen.

So wie man ruhig nimmt die Angst
vor Blitzen einem Kind,
sollt’ Wahrheit mählich uns erhell’n,
sonst würd’ ein jeder blind.

Text Authorship:

  • Translation from English to German (Deutsch) copyright © 2018 by Bertram Kottmann, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you must ask the copyright-holder(s) directly for permission. If you receive no response, you must consider it a refusal.

    Bertram Kottmann.  Contact: BKottmann (AT) t-online.de

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This text was added to the website: 2018-06-29
Line count: 8
Word count: 40

Translation © by Bertram Kottmann
4. We grow accustomed to the Dark  [sung text not yet checked]
Language: English 
We grow accustomed to the Dark -
When Light is put away -
As when the Neighbor holds the Lamp
To witness her Good bye - 

A Moment - We uncertain step
For newness of the night -
Then - fit our Vision to the Dark -
And meet the Road - erect - 

And so of larger - Darknesses -
Those Evenings of the Brain -
When not a Moon disclose a sign -
Or Star - come out - within -

The Bravest - grope a little -
And sometimes hit a Tree
Directly in the Forehead -
But as they learn to see - 

Either the Darkness alters -
Or something in the sight
Adjusts itself to Midnight -
And Life steps almost straight.

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by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886)
4.
Language: German (Deutsch) 
Wir stellen uns aufs Dunkel ein,
wenn’s uns an Licht gebricht,
wie wenn, gehn wir vom Nachbarn heim,
weicht seiner Lampe Licht.

Nur kurz - ist zaghaft unser Schritt,
an Nacht noch nicht gewohnt,
dann wirkt das Aug im Dunkel mit:
wir schreiten sicher fort.

So auch, wenn es noch finstrer wird -
wenn’s Abend wird im Hirn,
wenn uns kein Mond und auch kein Stern
im Kopf ein Zeichen gibt.

Die Kühnsten tasten sich den Weg,
stoßen gelegentlich
die Stirn am Baume sich,
doch wenn sie besser seh’n,

wandelt das Dunkel sich
oder etwas in ihrem Seh’n
stellt sich auf tiefstes Dunkel ein:
Fast glatt wird’s dann im Leben gehn.

Text Authorship:

  • Translation from English to German (Deutsch) copyright © 2018 by Bertram Kottmann, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you must ask the copyright-holder(s) directly for permission. If you receive no response, you must consider it a refusal.

    Bertram Kottmann.  Contact: BKottmann (AT) t-online.de

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Based on:

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This text was added to the website: 2018-06-29
Line count: 20
Word count: 109

Translation © by Bertram Kottmann
5. The wind tapped like a tired man  [sung text not yet checked]
Language: English 
The wind tapped like a tired man,
And like a host, "Come in,"
I boldly answered; entered then
My residence within

A rapid, footless guest,
To offer whom a chair
Were as impossible as hand
A sofa to the air.

No bone had he to bind him,
His speech was like the push
Of numerous humming-birds at once
From a superior bush.

His countenance a billow,
His fingers, if he pass,
Let go a music, as of tunes
Blown tremulous in glass.

He visited, still flitting;
Then, like a timid man,
Again he tapped - 't was flurriedly -
And I became alone.

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by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886)
5.
Language: German (Deutsch) 
Wind klopfte wie ein müder Mann,
ich bat ihn kühn herein,
auf dass in Windeseil’ er dann
als Gast trat bei mir ein -

ein Gast, der fußlos kam;
ihm anzubieten einen Stuhl,
böt’ sich so wenig an
wie eine Ruhecouch der Luft.

Kein Körper war ihm eigen. -
Er klang wie Flügelschlag
von Kolibris, die zahllos schwirr’n
umher in Blütenzweigen.

Er kam wie Wellengang.
Zog er vorbei als Brise,
erklang Musik aus seiner Hand,
als ob man sacht in Gläser bliese.

Noch huschte er umher, mein Gast,
um dann mit scheuem Blick
letztmals zu klopfen - voller Hast.
Ich blieb allein zurück.

Text Authorship:

  • Translation from English to German (Deutsch) copyright © 2018 by Bertram Kottmann, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you must ask the copyright-holder(s) directly for permission. If you receive no response, you must consider it a refusal.

    Bertram Kottmann.  Contact: BKottmann (AT) t-online.de

    If you wish to commission a new translation, please contact:

Based on:

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This text was added to the website: 2018-06-29
Line count: 20
Word count: 100

Translation © by Bertram Kottmann