LiederNet logo

CONTENTS

×
  • Home | Introduction
  • Composers (20,139)
  • Text Authors (19,558)
  • Go to a Random Text
  • What’s New
  • A Small Tour
  • FAQ & Links
  • Donors
  • DONATE

UTILITIES

  • Search Everything
  • Search by Surname
  • Search by Title or First Line
  • Search by Year
  • Search by Collection

CREDITS

  • Emily Ezust
  • Contributors (1,114)
  • Contact Information
  • Bibliography

  • Copyright Statement
  • Privacy Policy

Follow us on Facebook

×

Attention! Some of this material is not in the public domain.

It is illegal to copy and distribute our copyright-protected material without permission. It is also illegal to reprint copyright texts or translations without the name of the author or translator.

To inquire about permissions and rates, contact Emily Ezust at licenses@email.lieder.example.net

If you wish to reprint translations, please make sure you include the names of the translators in your email. They are below each translation.

Note: You must use the copyright symbol © when you reprint copyright-protected material.

by William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939)
Translation © by Pierre Mathé

Who dreamed that beauty passes like a...
Language: English 
Our translations:  FRE
Who dreamed that beauty passes like a dream?
For these red lips, with all their mournful pride,
Mournful that no new wonder may betide,
Troy passed away in one high funeral gleam,
And Usna's children died.

We and the labouring world are passing by:
Amid men's souls, that waver and give place,
Like the pale waters in their wintry race,
Under the passing stars, foam of the sky,
Lives on this lonely face.

Bow down, archangels, in your dim abode:
Before you were, or any hearts to beat,
Weary and kind one lingered by His seat;
He made the world to be a grassy road
Before her wandering feet.

About the headline (FAQ)

First published in National Observer, January 1892, revised same year

Confirmed with The Poetical Works of William B. Yeats in two volumes, volume 1 : Lyrical Poems, The Macmillan Company, New York and London, 1906, page 170.


Text Authorship:

  • by William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939), "Rosa Mundi", appears in The Rose [author's text checked 2 times 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 Stanley Grill (b. 1953), "The Rose of the World", copyright © 1977 [ soprano and piano ], from Six Songs, no. 1, confirmed with an online score [sung text checked 1 time]
  • by John Verrall (b. 1908), "The rose of the world" [ soprano, flute, and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]

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

  • FRE French (Français) (Pierre Mathé) , copyright © 2016, (re)printed on this website with kind permission


Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2009-01-20
Line count: 15
Word count: 109

Qui rêva que la beauté passe comme un...
Language: French (Français)  after the English 
Qui rêva que la beauté passe comme un rêve ?
Pour ces lèvres rouges, avec toute leur triste fierté,
Tristes qu'aucune nouvelle merveille ne puisse advenir,
Troie disparut dans un grand embrasement funèbre,
Et les enfants d'Usna périrent.

Nous et le monde laborieux nous passons :
Parmi les âmes des hommes, qui vacillent et laissent la place,
Comme les eaux pâles dans leur course hivernale,
Sous les étoiles passagères, écume du ciel,
Cette figure solitaire persiste.

Inclinez-vous, archanges, dans votre sombre demeure :
Avant que vous ne soyez, ou qu'un cœur ne batte,
Une personne lasse et douce s'attardait auprès de Son trône ;
Il fit le monde être un chemin herbeux
Devant ses pieds vagabonds.

About the headline (FAQ)

Translation of title "Rosa mundi" = "La rose du monde"

Text Authorship:

  • Translation from English to French (Français) copyright © 2016 by Pierre Mathé, (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 English by William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939), "Rosa Mundi", appears in The Rose
    • Go to the text page.

 

This text was added to the website: 2016-01-04
Line count: 15
Word count: 112

Gentle Reminder

This website began in 1995 as a personal project by Emily Ezust, who has been working on it full-time without a salary since 2008. Our research has never had any government or institutional funding, so if you found the information here useful, please consider making a donation. Your help is greatly appreciated!
–Emily Ezust, Founder

Donate

We use cookies for internal analytics and to earn much-needed advertising revenue. (Did you know you can help support us by turning off ad-blockers?) To learn more, see our Privacy Policy. To learn how to opt out of cookies, please visit this site.

I acknowledge the use of cookies

Contact
Copyright
Privacy

Copyright © 2025 The LiederNet Archive

Site redesign by Shawn Thuris