I shall never tell you

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by Robert Eduard Prutz (1816 - 1872)

Translation © by Sharon Krebs, Harald Krebs

Ich will's dir nimmer sagen

Language: German (Deutsch)

Our translations: ENG

Ich will's dir nimmer sagen,
Wie ich so lieb dich hab',
Im Herzen will ich's tragen,
Will stumm sein wie das Grab.

Kein Lied soll dir's gestehen,
Soll flehen um mein Glück,
Du selber sollst es sehen,
Du selbst -- in meinem Blick.

Und kannst du es nicht lesen,
Was dort so zärtlich spricht,
So ist's ein Traum gewesen;
Dem Träumer zürne nicht.

Available sung texts: (what is this?)

• H. Henkel • J. Lang • E. Lassen • C. Schnabel

About the headline (FAQ)

View text with all available footnotes

Confirmed with Robert Prutz, Buch der Liebe, Fünfte Auflage, Leipzig: Verlag von Ernst Keil, 1883, page 45. Note: C. Schnabel's score has a typo in stanza 2, line 2, word 4 ("dein" instead of "mein").

Text Authorship:

by Robert Eduard Prutz (1816 - 1872), no title, appears in Buch der Liebe, in 2. Zweites Buch, in Frühlingsliebe, no. 2 [author's text checked 2 times against a primary source]

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Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , John Versmoren , Sharon Krebs [Senior Associate Editor], Johann Winkler

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 12
Word count: 66

I shall never tell you

NOTE: the footnotes have been removed from this text; return to general view

Language: English after the German (Deutsch)

I shall never tell you
How much I love you.
I shall carry it in my heart,
And shall be as mute as the grave.
 
No song poem shall confess it to you,
Shall plead for my happiness;
You yourself must see it,
You yourself must see it in my gaze.
 
And if you cannot read
What speaks so tenderly there,
Then it was but a dream.
Do not be angry with the dreamer!

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Translated titles:
"Entsagung" = "Renunciation"
"Ich will's dir nimmer sagen" and "Ich will dir's nimmer sagen" = "I shall never tell you"
"Mein Geheimniss" = "My secret"
"Stille Liebe" = "Silent love"
"Verschwiegene Liebe" = "Concealed love"
"Volkslied" = "Folksong"
"Vorsatz" = "Resolution"

Text Authorship:

Translation from German (Deutsch) to English copyright © 2006 by Sharon Krebs and Harald Krebs, (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.
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Based on:

a text in German (Deutsch) by Robert Eduard Prutz (1816 - 1872), no title, appears in Buch der Liebe, in 2. Zweites Buch, in Frühlingsliebe, no. 2
- Go to the text page.

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This text was added to the website: 2006-12-23
Line count: 12
Word count: 75