by Thomas Hardy (1840 - 1928)
The man he killed
Language: English
Our translations: GER
Had he and I but met By some old ancient inn, We should have sat us down to wet Right many a nipperkin! But ranged as infantry, And staring face to face, I shot at him as he at me, And killed him in his place. I shot him dead because - Because he was my foe, Just so: my foe of course he was; That's clear enough; although He thought he'd 'list perhaps, Offhand like - just as I - Was out of work, had sold his traps, No other reason why. Yes, quaint and curious war is! You shoot a fellow down You'd treat, if met where any bar is, Or help to half-a-crown.
G. Baxter sets stanzas 1-2, 4-5
Text Authorship:
- by Thomas Hardy (1840 - 1928), appears in Time's Laughingstocks and Other Verses, first published 1909 [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 Garth Baxter (b. 1946), "The man he killed", stanzas 1-2,4-5 [ satb chorus and piano ], from The Battle Cry, no. 3 [sung text checked 1 time]
- by John Pierre Herman Joubert (1927 - 2019), "The man he killed", op. 109 no. 4 (1985), from South of the Line, no. 4 [sung text checked 1 time]
Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- GER German (Deutsch) [singable] (Walter A. Aue) , "Der Mann, den er erschoß", copyright © 2010, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
Researcher for this page: Garth Baxter
This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 20
Word count: 113