Is This What You Call Love? Lyrics > Sondheim on Sondheim

Love is what you earn
And return
When you care for another
So much that th? other's
Set free
Don't you see?
Can't you understand?

Lov?'s not a constant demand
It's a gift you bestow
Love isn't sudden surrender
It's tender and slow
It must grow

Yet everywhere I go
You appear
Or I know
You are near
This is not love
Just a need for possession

Call it what you will
This is not love
This is the reverse
Like a curse
Something out of control
I've begun to fear
For my soul...
[STEPHEN SONDHEIM, spoken]
We had a very difficult time during previews with Passion because the audience would not buy the idea that this good-looking guy would, would fall in love with this obsessive, grasping, difficult, unpleasant woman. So I wrote a song called "Loving You" which is very simple but which is very heartfelt. It's a very Oscar Hammerstein-like song. And by the end of that song, the audience was softened enough towards her and realized that her love was pure even though her behavior was not. And it sort of, um, turned the corner of the show.

Last Update: October, 24th 2023