Epitaph | « Far from the eyes, close to the heart »

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by Ludwig Jacobowski (1868 - 1900)

Translation © by Jean-Pierre Granger

Grabschrift

Language: German (Deutsch)

Our translations: CAT ENG FRE

"Dem Auge fern, dem Herzen nah!"
Als ich die alte Grabschrift sah
Im eingesunknen Marmorstein,
Da fiel mein totes Lieb mir ein.

O Gott, ich schrieb schon tausendmal
Das gleiche Lied aus gleicher Qual,
Und war doch keins wie dieses da:
"Dem Auge fern, dem Herzen nah!"

Text Authorship:

by Ludwig Jacobowski (1868 - 1900) [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 Alban Maria Johannes Berg (1885 - 1935), "Grabschrift", 1904 [ voice and piano ], from Jugendlieder, Vol. I (1901-04), no. 31 [sung text checked 1 time]

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

CAT Catalan (Català) (Manuel Capdevila i Font) , "Epitafi", copyright © 2025, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
ENG English (Jean-Pierre Granger) , "Epitaph", copyright © 2011, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
FRE French (Français) (Jean-Pierre Granger) , "Épitaphe", copyright © 2011, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this page: Jakob Kellner

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 8
Word count: 47

Epitaph

Language: English after the German (Deutsch)

« Far from the eyes, close to the heart »
As I saw that epitaph
Deeply engraved in the marblestone,
The memory of my deceased love came back to me

Oh my God ! I have already written a thousand times
The same song of that same torment,
And none was like this one :
« Far from the eyes, close to the heart ! »

Text Authorship:

Translation from German (Deutsch) to English copyright © 2011 by Jean-Pierre Granger.
This author's work falls under the CC BY-SA 2.0 license.

Jean-Pierre Granger. We have no current contact information for the copyright-holder.
If you wish to commission a new translation, please contact: licenses@email.lieder.example.net

Based on:

a text in German (Deutsch) by Ludwig Jacobowski (1868 - 1900)
- Go to the text page.

This text was added to the website: 2011-04-01
Line count: 8
Word count: 63