Monday, April 25, 2011

Hymn Of Hate

French and Russian, they matter not,
A blow for a blow, a shot for a shot,
We fight the battle with bronze and steel,
And the time that is coming Peace will seal.
You we will hate with a lasting hate,
We will never forego our hate,
Hate by water and hate by land,
Hate of the head and hate of the hand,
Hate of the hammer and hate of the crown,
Hate of seventy millions choking down.
We love as one, we hate as one,
We have one foe and one alone
– ENGLAND!
 
- Ernst Lissauer (1914)
 
"The hymn was distributed in the German army, taught to German school children, set to music and sung in concerts. Lissauer was decorated for it by the Kaiser. It was also quickly used as counter-propaganda: translated into English and published in Britain and the U.S.A. to show how hateful those beastly Huns were and also to turn it round, by training English readers to hate the Germans back." - Friendship and Emnity in the First World War, Max Saunders, Literature & History Third Series Spring 2008 (Manchester University Press), 17 1, p62-77.

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