One of my favorite songs by Brahms, op. 47, no. 3, sung by the Swedish mezzo Anne Sofie von Otter, accompanied by her longtime collaborator Bengt Forsberg. The text, an adaptation by Johann Ludwig Uhland of an old German folk poem, is, in translation:
I have not seen my beloved this whole week;
I saw her on a Sunday, standing before the door;
That thousand-times beautiful girl,
That thousand-times dear heart,
I would to God I were with her today.
I will not leave off laughing this whole week;
I saw her on a Sunday, going to Church.
That thousand-times beautiful girl,
That thousand-times dear heart,
I would to God I were with her today.
It is one of the most perfect songs ever written.
Brothers, love is a teacher, but a hard one to obtain: learning to love is hard and we pay dearly for it. It takes hard work and a long apprenticeship, for it is not just for a moment that we must learn to love, but forever. (Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov)
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