The publishing history of
My true love hath my heart is uncertain. Officially the song entitled
Mon amour a mon cœur (poem by Barbier) was written in 1875 after Gounod’s return to Paris. However, one glance at the French text is sufficient to identify it as a translation of Sir Philip Sidney’s celebrated poem. It is also evident that in deference to the poet Gounod was attempting a musical stylization—in this case the deliberately antique Elizabethan madrigal style. There is no record of this song being published in English but it is almost certain that it was among the manuscripts which the composer brought back with him from England. In his usual manner Gounod is selective about how much of the poem he chooses to use.
from notes by Graham Johnson © 1993
