from Act III of the French opera
Werther by Jules Massenet
Libretto: Edouard Blau
Role: Werther, a poet, about 23 years old
Voice Part: tenor Fach: lyric tenor
Setting: the Magistrate's house at Christmas, Frankfurt, Germany, 1780
Synopsis: Werther has come back to see Charlotte, his love who is married to another man. She shows him some of the books that they used to read together. One book in particular, a collection of Ossain's verses, sparks Werther to ask spring to cease its gentle caresses upon him, for sadness and grief is now his fate.