A childlike beauty just fifteen years old

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by Pierre de Ronsard (1524 - 1585)

Translation © by David Wyatt

Une beauté de quinze ans enfantine

Language: French (Français)

Our translations: ENG

Une beauté de quinze ans enfantine,
Un or frisé de maint crêpe anelet,
Un front de rose, un teint damoiselet,
Un ris qui l'âme aux Astres achemine ;

Une vertu de telles beautés digne,
Un col de neige, une gorge de lait,
Un coeur jà mûr en un sein verdelet,
En Dame humaine une beauté divine ;

Un oeil puissant de faire jours les nuits,
Une main douce à forcer les ennuis,
Qui tient ma vie en ses doigts enfermée

Avec un chant découpé doucement
Ore d'un ris, or' d'un gémissement,
De tels sorciers ma raison fut charmée.

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Text Authorship:

by Pierre de Ronsard (1524 - 1585), no title [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 Ina Bottelier (b. 1943), "Une beauté de quinze ans enfantine", published 2001, copyright © 1992 [ voice and piano or guitar ], from Quatre Poèmes de Ronsard, no. 3, Heiloo (Hollande / Netherlands), Éd. Nieuwe Lente/Red Frog Music [sung text not yet checked]
by Robert Caby (1905 - 1992), "Une beauté de quinze ans enfantine", 1957 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]

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

ENG English (David Wyatt) , copyright © 2019, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2014-10-30
Line count: 14
Word count: 96

A childlike beauty just fifteen years...

Language: English after the French (Français)

A childlike beauty just fifteen years old,
The curled gold of so many ringlets
A rosy brow, a maiden’s hue,
A smile which carries my soul to the stars :
 
A virtue worthy of such beauty
A snowy neck, a milk-white throat,
A heart already ripe in a youthful breast
In a human Lady, a divine beauty :
 
An eye with the power to make nights into days,
A soft hand to drive off cares,
Which holds my life enclosed in its fingers :
 
With a song softly ending
Now in a laugh, now in a sigh :
With such sorcery my reason has been charmed.

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Text Authorship:

Translation from French (Français) to English copyright © 2019 by David Wyatt, (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 Pierre de Ronsard (1524 - 1585), no title
- Go to the text page.

This text was added to the website: 2019-10-30
Line count: 14
Word count: 102