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by René-François Sully-Prudhomme (1839 - 1907)

L'Idéal
Language: French (Français) 
Our translations:  ENG
La lune est grande, le ciel clair
Et plein d'astres, la terre est blême,
Et l'âme du monde est dans l'air.
Je rêve à l'étoile suprême.

À celle qu'on n'aperçoit pas,
Mais dont la lumière voyage 
Et doit venir jusqu'ici-bas
Enchanter les yeux d'un autre âge.

Quand luira cette étoile un jour,
La plus belle et la plus lointaine,
Dites-lui qu'elle eût mon amour,
Ô derniers de la race humaine!

View text with all available footnotes

Text Authorship:

  • by René-François Sully-Prudhomme (1839 - 1907), "L'Idéal", written 1865-66, appears in Stances et Poèmes, in 1. Stances, in La Vie intérieure, no. 18, Paris, Éd. Alphonse Lemerre, first published 1866 [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 Cécile Blanc de Fontbelle (1892 - 1973), "L'Idéal", published 1924 [ high voice and piano ], Éd. Max Eschig [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Gerardus Hubertus Galenus von Brucken Fock (1859 - 1935), "L’Idéal", op. 28 (7 Liederen) no. 4 (1917) [ voice and piano ] [sung text checked 1 time]
  • by Pierre Cettier (b. 1874), "L'Idéal", published 1923 [ high voice and piano ], from Deux Mélodies, chant et piano, no. 1, Éditions F. Durdilly, Ch. Hayet, successeur [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Cécile Chaminade (1857 - 1944), "L'Idéal", published 1888 [ medium voice and piano ] [sung text checked 1 time]
  • by Charles Colas , "L'Idéal", published 1926 [ tenor and piano ], from Mélodies pour ténor, no. 3, Paris, Édition B. Roudanez [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Daniel Ruyneman (1886 - 1963), "L'Idéal", 1914 [ high voice and piano ], from Trois mélodies, no. 2, Amsterdam, Éd. K. Van der Meer [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Domingo Santa Cruz Wilson (1899 - 1987), "L'Idéal", op. 6a no. 1 [ female voice and piano ], from Dos canciones, no. 1 [sung text not yet checked]

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

  • ENG English (Peter Low) , "The Ideal", copyright © 2022, (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: 72

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