LiederNet logo

CONTENTS

×
  • Home | Introduction
  • Composers (20,103)
  • Text Authors (19,447)
  • 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 Johann Gottfried Herder (1744 - 1803)
Translation © by Guy Laffaille

Den gordischen Knoten
Language: German (Deutsch)  after the English 
Our translations:  CAT DUT ENG FRE SPA
Den gordischen Knoten,
Den Liebe sich band,
Kann brechen, kann lösen
Ihn sterbliche Hand?
Was müht ihr, was sinnet
Ihr listigen Zweck?
Durch was ihr beginnet,
Find't Liebe den Weg.

Und wär' er verriegelt,
Und wär' er verkannt,
Sein Name versiegelt
Und nimmer genannt,
Mitleidige Winde,
Ihr schlüpftet zu mir
Und brächtet mir Zeitung
Und brächtet ihn mir.

Wär'st fern über Bergen,
Wär'st [weit]1 über'm Meer:
Ich wandert' durch Berge,
Ich schwämme durchs Meer;
Wärst, Liebchen, ein' Schwalbe
Und schlüpftest am Bach,
Ich, Liebchen, wär' Schwalbe
Und schlüpfte dir nach.

Available sung texts: (what is this?)

•   J. Brahms 

About the headline (FAQ)

View original text (without footnotes)
1 Brahms: "fern"

Text Authorship:

  • by Johann Gottfried Herder (1744 - 1803), "Weg der Liebe" [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]

Based on:

  • a text in English from Volkslieder (Folksongs) , appears in Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, collected by Thomas Percy
    • Go to the text page.

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

  • by Johannes Brahms (1833 - 1897), "Weg der Liebe II", op. 20 (Drei Duette) no. 2 (1858), published 1862 [ duet for soprano and alto with piano ], Bonn, N. Simrock [sung text checked 1 time]
  • by Max Bruch (1838 - 1920), "Weg der Liebe II", op. 49 (Lieder und Gesänge für 1 Singstimme mit Pianoforte) no. 6, published 1882 [ voice and piano ], Berlin, Simrock [sung text not yet checked]

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

  • CAT Catalan (Català) (Salvador Pila) , copyright © 2022, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • DUT Dutch (Nederlands) [singable] (Lau Kanen) , "De weg der liefde II", copyright © 2014, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • ENG English (Malcolm Wren) , copyright © 2019, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • FRE French (Français) (Guy Laffaille) , "Chemin de l'amour", copyright © 2009, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • SPA Spanish (Español) (Alfonso Sebastián) , copyright © 2021, (re)printed on this website with kind permission


Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2003-11-10
Line count: 24
Word count: 91

Chemin de l'amour
Language: French (Français)  after the German (Deutsch) 
Le nœud gordien
que l'amour a noué,
Une main mortelle
Peut-elle le rompre, le défaire ?
Pourquoi se battre, pourquoi méditer
Pour un but rusé ?
Puisque, quoi que nous fassions,
l'amour trouve un chemin.

Et s'il était enfermé
Et s'il n'était pas reconnu,
Son nom scellé
Et jamais mentionné,
Vents gémissants,
Vous glisseriez vers moi,
Et m'apporteriez des nouvelles
Et me l'apporteriez.

Si tu étais loin sur les montagnes,
Loin au-dessus des mers,
Je voudrais marcher sur les montagnes,
nager à travers les mers.
Si, mon amour, tu étais une hirondelle
Glissant près du ruisseau,
Moi, mon amour, je voudrais être une hirondelle
Glissant après toi.

Text Authorship:

  • Translation from German (Deutsch) to French (Français) copyright © 2009 by Guy Laffaille, (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 German (Deutsch) by Johann Gottfried Herder (1744 - 1803), "Weg der Liebe"
    • Go to the text page.

Based on:

  • a text in English from Volkslieder (Folksongs) , appears in Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, collected by Thomas Percy
    • Go to the text page.

 

This text was added to the website: 2009-12-29
Line count: 24
Word count: 105

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