Skip to main content
Faust, Part One

**Faust:** You heavenly sounds, powerful...

Overview

Gender
Male
Playing Age
Adult
Style
Dramatic
Act/Scene
Scene One
Time & Place
The monologue occurs in Faust's cluttered, gothic academic study in Germany at the break of dawn on Easter morning.
Length
Medium
Time Period
Classical
Show Type
Play
Age Guidance
Thirteen Plus (PG-13)

Context

Text

Faust: You heavenly sounds, powerful and mild,

Why, in the dust, here, do you seek me?

Ring out where tender hearts are reconciled.

I hear your message, but faith fails me:

The marvellous is faith’s dearest child.

I don’t attempt to rise to that sphere,

From which the message rings:

Yet I know from childhood what it sings,

And I’m recalled to life once more.

In other times a Heavenly kiss would fall.

On me, in the deep Sabbath silence:

The bell notes filled with presentiments,

And a prayer was pleasure’s call:

A sweet yearning, beyond my understanding,

Set me wandering through woods and fields,

And while a thousand tears were burning

I felt a world around me come to be.

Love called out the lively games of youth,

The joy of spring’s idle holiday:

Memory’s childish feelings, in truth,

Hold me back from the last sombre way.

O, sing on you sweet songs of Heaven!

My tears flow, Earth claims me again!

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, Part One. Trans. A. S. Kline. https://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/German/FaustIScenesItoIII.php

Performance Tips

Emotional Beat Breakdown

Related Learning Modules

More Monologues

All monologues are the property and copyright of their owners.

Monologues are presented on StageAgent for educational purposes only.