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by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616)
Translation © by Ferdinando Albeggiani

Be wise as thou art cruel; do not press
Language: English 
Our translations:  ITA
Be wise as thou art cruel; do not press
My tongue-tied patience with too much disdain;
Lest sorrow lend me words, and words express
The manner of my pity-wanting pain.
If I might teach thee wit, better it were,
Though not to love, yet, love to tell me so; --
As testy sick men, when their deaths be near,
No news but health from their physicians know; --
For, if I should despair, I should grow mad,
And in my madness might speak ill of thee;
Now this ill-wresting world is grown so bad,
Mad slanderers by mad ears believed be.
    That I may not be so, nor thou belied,
    Bear thine eyes straight, though thy proud heart go wide.

About the headline (FAQ)

Text Authorship:

  • by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), no title, appears in Sonnets, no. 140 [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 Richard Simpson (1820 - 1876), "Sonnet CXL", 1866 [ medium voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]

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

  • FRE French (Français) (François-Victor Hugo) , no title, appears in Sonnets de Shakespeare, no. 140, first published 1857
  • ITA Italian (Italiano) (Ferdinando Albeggiani) , copyright © 2025, (re)printed on this website with kind permission


Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2010-08-13
Line count: 14
Word count: 118

La tua crudeltà si accompagni a...
Language: Italian (Italiano)  after the English 
La tua crudeltà si accompagni a saggezza; non opprimere
la mia muta pazienza con un eccessivo disprezzo
al punto che  il dolore mi  spinga a parlare  e a esprimere
la misura  della pena che a causa tua sopporto.
Se posso darti un consiglio, meglio per te sarebbe,
pur se non mi ami, che tu fingessi il tuo amore;
come fa un medico  che parla di guarigione,
perché ne ha pietà, a un malato che muore.
Perché, se non avessi più speranze, folle potrei diventare
e, nella mia pazzia, di te potrei parlar male
e questo mondo si è fatto perverso fino al punto
che le calunnie più pazze sono credute vere.
Perché ciò non avvenga, e tu non sia diffamata,
tieni fermo il tuo sguardo anche se il tuo cuore muta.

About the headline (FAQ)

Text Authorship:

  • Translation from English to Italian (Italiano) copyright © 2025 by Ferdinando Albeggiani, (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 Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), no title, appears in Sonnets, no. 140
    • Go to the text page.

 

This text was added to the website: 2025-07-16
Line count: 14
Word count: 131

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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

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