L'oiseau bleu | Le lac était bleu au-dessous de la colline

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 Mary Coleridge (1861 - 1907)

Translation © by Dwain Richardson

The lake lay blue below the hill

Language: English

Our translations: DUT FRE GER

The lake lay blue below the hill,
O'er it, as I looked, there flew
Across the waters, cold and still,
A bird whose wings were palest blue.

The sky above was blue at last,
The sky beneath me blue in blue,
A moment, ere the bird had passed,
It caught his image as he flew.

About the headline (FAQ)

Text Authorship:

by Mary Coleridge (1861 - 1907), "L'oiseau bleu", appears in Poems, no. 52, first published 1907 [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 William Busch (1901 - 1945), "L'oiseau bleu", c1944 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Charles Villiers Stanford, Sir (1852 - 1924), "The blue bird", op. 119 (Eight partsongs) no. 3, published 1910 [ SSAA chorus a cappella ] [sung text checked 1 time]

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

DUT Dutch (Nederlands) (Nicolaas (Koos) Jaspers) , copyright © 1998, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
FRE French (Français) (Dwain Richardson) , "L'oiseau bleu", copyright © 2003, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
GER German (Deutsch) (Martin Stock) , "Der blaue Vogel", copyright © 2001, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this page: Virginia Knight

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 8
Word count: 55

L'oiseau bleu

Language: French (Français) after the English

Le lac était bleu au-dessous de la colline.
Lorsque j'ai regardé au-dessus, il y avait un oiseau qui a volé 
de l'autre côté des eaux, froid et immobile.
Ses ailes étaient pâles et bleues.

Enfin, le ciel était bleu, 
ainsi qu'en bas.
Une fois l'oiseau s'est passé,
son image était saisi pendant qu'il volait.

Text Authorship:

Translation from English to French (Français) copyright © 2003 by Dwain Richardson, (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 Mary Coleridge (1861 - 1907), "L'oiseau bleu", appears in Poems, no. 52, first published 1907
- Go to the text page.

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 8
Word count: 54