Fine expressed
her feelings [about World War II] in two song
collections. The first consists of two songs,
“Epigram,” and “Epitaph: upon the death
of Sir Albert Morton’s Wife,” on texts by Sir
William Jones (1746-1794) and Sir Henry Wotton
(1568-1639). She wrote the second collection,
“Songs of Our Times” (1943) for a concert
that Lazare Saminsky produced at the Temple Emmanuel [in
New York] to support the Russian/American efforts in the
war. The two songs, “Stabat Mater,” and
“And what did she get, the soldier’s
wife,” are about a woman’s sorrow during the
time of war. The first uses a Polish text by Josef
Wittlin and the second by Bertold Brecht is in German.
They are translated into English by Joy Davidman, and
Fine includes both the original and English texts so that
the singer may choose which language she prefers.[Also
see Songs of Love and War (1991)]
–Heidi Von Gunden,
The Music of Vivian Fine, Scarecrow Press,
1999