This letter is not a letter | This letter is not a letter

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by Victor Hugo (1802 - 1885)

Translation © by Grant Hicks

Cette lettre n'est pas une lettre

Language: French (Français)

Our translations: ENG

Cette lettre n'est pas une lettre ; 
ce n'est qu'un mot, mais ce mot, 
tout court qu’il est, mon doux ange, 
renferme un baiser long comme la vie, 
et un amour long comme l’éternité.

From a letter to Juliette Drouet dated January 1, 1857. This is a prose text; we have added line-breaks arbitrarily.

Text Authorship:

by Victor Hugo (1802 - 1885), written 1857 [author's text not yet checked 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 Renaud Gagneux (b. 1947), "Cette lettre n'est pas une lettre", 1990?, published 1990 [ soprano and piano ], from Quatre mots pour Juliette, Cycle de 4 mélodies sur des billets de V. Hugo à Juliette Drouet, no. 1, Éd. Durand [sung text checked 1 time]

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

ENG English (Grant Hicks) , "This letter is not a letter", copyright © 2025, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this page: Léa Pasquel

This text was added to the website: 2020-10-04
Line count: 5
Word count: 33

This letter is not a letter

Language: English after the French (Français)

This letter is not a letter;
it's only a word, but that word,
as short as it is, my sweet angel,
holds a kiss as long as life,
and a love as long as eternity.

Text Authorship:

Translation from French (Français) to English copyright © 2025 by Grant Hicks, (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 Victor Hugo (1802 - 1885), written 1857
- Go to the text page.

This text was added to the website: 2025-09-16
Line count: 5
Word count: 35