The world is cruel, the world is wicked
It's I alone whom you can trust in this whole city
I am your only friend
I who keep you, feed you, teach you, dress you

I who look upon you without fear
How can I protect you, boy, unless you
Always stay in here, away in here
Remember what I've taught you, Quasimodo

You are deformed (I am deformed)
And you are ugly (And I am ugly)
And these are crimes for which the world shows little pity
You do not comprehend
You are my one defender

Out there they'll revile you as a monster
I am a monster
Out there they will hate and scorn and jeer (only a monster)
Why invite their calumny and consternation?
Stay in here

Be faithful to me (I'm faithful)
Grateful to me (I'm grateful)
Do as I say, obey
And stay in here

Safe behind these windows and these parapets of stone
Gazing at the people down below me
All my life I watch them as I hide up here alone
Hungry for the histories they'd shown me

All my life I memorize their faces
Knowing them as they will never know me
All my life I wonder how it feels to pass a day
Not above them but part of them

And out there living in the sun
Give me one day out there
All I ask is one to hold forever
Out there where they all live unaware
What I'd give, what I'd dare
Just to live one day out there

Out there among the millers and the weavers and their wives
Through the roofs and gables I can see them
Every day they shout and scold and go about their lives
Heedless of the gift it is to be them
If I was in their skin, I'd treasure every instant

Out there strolling by the Seine
Taste a morning out there like ordinary men
Who freely walk about there just one day and then
I swear I'll be content with my share
Won't resent, won't despair, old and bent I won't care
I'll have spent one day out there!