Halfway through my essay on German nationalism, I got bored.
As with most times when I get bored, I looked to Youtube for inspiration.
Listened to the old German national anthem, "Deutscheland Uber Alles", and boy was it inspiring!
Unfortunately one thing led to another and I ended up listening to not just the German, but also the French, Japanese. and Chinese national anthems.
There was something to this, though.
The French and Chinese anthems were forceful and dynamic, their lyrics filled with a sense of bold action, their tunes implacably progressive and confident, saturated with the promise of initiative and of adventure, of change and of advancement.
The German and Japanese anthems, in contast, were stately and measured, their lines solid and staunch, their tunes uncompromising and majestic, full of noble dignity and ancient grandeur, of the assurance of history immutable and of traditions aeternal, of constancy and of endurance.
The French and Chinese anthems were bombastic, the German and Japanese ones reserved. The German and Japanese anthems exuded a sense of unfading wisdom, the French and Chinese ones a quality of impetuous exuberance.
I find it extremely interesting that these anthems should reflect the ideologies on which their respective nation-states were built.
French Republicanism and Chinese Communism were ignited by the rationality of the Enlightenment, the view that Reason would sweep aside the old order, abolish the ancien regimes that were founded on superstition and ignorance, and bring a new world based on onward progress, driven by the power of revolution. The world would be made anew by human hands, no longer shackled by the old beliefs of nature and predetermination. One cannot resist the force of change, of transformation and transition.
German Romanticism and Japanese Imperialism were established by the great Romantic belief in the immutable traditions of the past, the undying strengths and weaknesses of peoples as they are, the unchanging fundamentals of human nature, and the cyclical nature of History Itself. People will always be people; their values lie not in abstract artificiality and hollow philosophising but in organic culture, in the traditions which constitute the very cores of their identities. One cannot defy the Spirit Hand of History, of Humanity Itself.
Most fascinating. Most curious. I cannot decide where my sympathies truly lie. But that is because I have found yet another anthem, now my favourite, one which perfectly combines both Republican and Romantic themes into one epic piece of music:
The Unbreakable Union of Socialist Republics, the Anthem of the old Soviet Union!
