I
Le mien ne mange pas les souris ; [il n’aime pas ça]1.
Il n’en attrape que pour jouer avec. 
Quand il a bien joué, il lui fait grâce de la vie, 
et il va rêver ailleurs, l’innocent, 
assis dans la boucle de sa queue, 
la tête bien fermée comme un [poing]2.
Mais à cause des griffes, la souris est morte.

II
On lui dit : « Prend les souris et laisse les oiseaux ! » 
C'est bien subtil, et le chat [le plus fin]3 quelquefois se trompe. 

I. Aboulker sets stanza 2 in (at least) one setting - see below for more information
I. Aboulker sets stanza 1 in (at least) one setting - see below for more information
B. Rossignol sets stanza 1

About the headline (FAQ)

View original text (without footnotes)

Confirmed with Jules Renard, Histoires naturelles, Paris, Modern-Bibliothèque, 1894, page 32.

¹ Aboulker: "oui, oui, oui, pas les souris"
² Aboulker: "point"
³ omitted by Aboulker.

Text Authorship:

• by Jules Renard (1864 - 1910), "Le Chat", appears in Histoires naturelles [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 Isabelle Aboulker (b. 1938), "Le Chat et les Oiseaux", published 2011, stanza 2 [ medium voice and piano ], from Petites histoires naturelles, no. 2, Paris, Éd. Henry Lemoine [sung text checked 1 time]
• by Isabelle Aboulker (b. 1938), "Le Chat et les Souris", stanza 1 [ voice and piano ], from Petites histoires naturelles - recueil 2, no. 1, Paris, Éd. Alphonse Leduc [sung text checked 1 time]
• by Bruno Rossignol (b. 1958), "Le Chat", published 2010, stanza 1 [ medium voice and piano ], from Nouvelles Histoires naturelles, no. 5, Éd. Delatour France  [sung text not yet checked]

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2021-11-28
Line count: 11
Word count: 90