Zweites Lied der Ophelia | Guten Morgen, 's ist Sankt Valentinstag

by Anonymous / Unidentified Author and sometimes misattributed to William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616)

Translation by Karl Joseph Simrock (1802 - 1876) and sometimes misattributed to Ludwig Wilhelm Friedrich Seeger (1810 - 1864)

To‑morrow is Saint Valentine's day

Language: English

  [To-morrow is]¹ Saint Valentine's day,
  All in the morning [betime]²,
  And I a maid at your window,
  To be your Valentine.
  Then up he rose, and donn'd his clothes,
  And dupp'd the chamber-door;
  Let in the maid, that out a maid
  Never departed more.

[Indeed, without an oath, I'll make an end on't!]³
  By Gis and by Saint Charity,
  Alack, and fie for shame!
  Young men will do't, if they come to't;
  By cock, they are to blame.
  Quoth she, before you tumbled me,
  You promised me to wed.

  [So]⁴ would I ha' done, by yonder sun,
  An thou hadst not come to my bed.

J. Brahms sets stanza 1
R. Quilter sets lines 1-4

About the headline (FAQ)

View original text (without footnotes)

These words are sung by Ophelia in Shakespeare's play Hamlet, Act IV, Scene 5, but they are probably not by Shakespeare.

¹ Quilter: "Good morrow, 'tis "
² Quilter: "time"
³ omitted by Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Grill
⁴ Castelnuovo-Tedesco: "He answers,/ So"

Text Authorship:

by Anonymous / Unidentified Author, appears in Hamlet
sometimes misattributed to William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616)

See other settings of this text.

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

FRE French (Français) (François-Victor Hugo)
GER German (Deutsch) (Ludwig Wilhelm Friedrich Seeger) , no title, appears in Shakespeare in deutscher Übersetzung, in 6. Hamlet

Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Malcolm Wren [Guest Editor]

This text was added to the website: 2003-11-26
Line count: 17
Word count: 111

Zweites Lied der Ophelia

(Sung text for setting by R. Strauss)

See original

Language: German (Deutsch) after the English

Our translations: DUT ENG FRE

Guten Morgen, 's ist Sankt Valentinstag,
  So früh vor Sonnenschein
Ich junge Maid am Fensterschlag
  Will euer Valentin sein.
 
Der junge Mann tut Hosen an,
  Tät auf die Kammerthür,
Ließ ein die Maid, die als  ...  Maid
  Ging nimmermehr herfür.
 
Bei Sankt Niklas und Charitas!
  Ein unverschämt Geschlecht!
Ein junger Mann thut's, wenn er kann,
  Fürwahr, das ist nicht recht.
 
Sie sprach: Eh' ihr gescherzt mit mir,
  Verspracht ihr mich zu frei'n.
 
Ich bräch's auch nicht, bei'm Sonnenlicht,
  Wär'st du nicht kommen herein.

Note: according to The Cambridge Companion to Richard Strauss, ed. by Charles Youmans, Seeger is listed as the translator of Hamlet, but Seeger's translations are quite different. Simrock and Seeger are listed together as the translators for the ten-volume set.

Note (provided by Sharon Krebs): Ophelia’s song is interrupted at several points by various other characters and herself. Those interruptions have not been included above.

Composition:

Richard Georg Strauss

Sechs Lieder

Text Authorship:

by Karl Joseph Simrock (1802 - 1876), no title, appears in Shakespeare in deutscher Übersetzung, in 6. Hamlet, first published 1868
sometimes misattributed to Ludwig Wilhelm Friedrich Seeger (1810 - 1864)

Based on:

a text in English by Anonymous/Unidentified Artist , appears in Hamlet and misattributed to William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616)
- Go to the text page.

Go to the general single-text view

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

Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Sharon Krebs [Guest Editor]

This text was added to the website: 2003-11-26
Line count: 16
Word count: 87