The Dance of the Gods | I had poured my entire soul into a song

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by Franz Toussaint (1879 - 1955)

Translation © by Grant Hicks

La danse des dieux

Language: French (Français) after the Chinese (中文)

Our translations: ENG

J'avais mis toute mon âme dans une chanson
que j'ai chanté aux hommes, et ils ont ri !
j'ai pris mon luth,
je suis allé m'asseoir au sommet d'une montagne
et j'ai chanté, pour les Dieux, la chanson 
que les hommes n'avaient pas comprise.
Le soleil se couchait.
Au rhythme de ma chanson,
les Dieux ont dansé sur les nuages rouges
qui flottaient dans le ciel.

Available sung texts: (what is this?)

• R. Wertheim

View text with all available footnotes

Confirmed with Franz Toussaint, La flûte de jade, poésies chinoises, Paris, L'édition d'art H. Piazza, 1920, pages 130-131.

Text Authorship:

by Franz Toussaint (1879 - 1955), "La danse des Dieux" [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]

Based on:

a text in Chinese (中文) by Li-Tai-Po (701 - 762) [text unavailable]
- Go to the text page.

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Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Grant Hicks [Guest Editor] , Malcolm Wren [Guest Editor] , Joost van der Linden [Guest Editor]

This text was added to the website: 2017-12-24
Line count: 10
Word count: 66

The Dance of the Gods

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

Language: English after the French (Français)

I had poured my entire soul into a song
which I sang for men, and they laughed!
I took up my lute,
and went and sat down on a mountaintop 
and sang, for the Gods, the song
that men had not understood.
The sun was setting.
To the rhythm of my song,
the Gods danced upon the red clouds
that were floating in the sky.

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Text Authorship:

Translation from French (Français) to English copyright © 2026 by Grant Hicks, (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 French (Français) by Franz Toussaint (1879 - 1955), "La danse des Dieux"
- Go to the text page.

Based on:

a text in Chinese (中文) by Li-Tai-Po (701 - 762) [text unavailable]
- Go to the text page.

Go to the general view

This text was added to the website: 2026-04-14
Line count: 10
Word count: 66