Of Anthems and European Identity

News Type: Event — Tue Jan 22, 2008 8:11 PM EST

politics, europe, european-union, patriotism, anthem, maya-angelou, star-spangled-banner, ode-to-joy, robert-service

European flag outside the EU offices, Maastricht. Photo by Atticus Mullikin

It's time that Europeans learned their anthem. Problem is, it doesn't have any words.

Ode to Joy became the anthem of the European Union in the 1970s, but the profusion of languages in the EU and an historical aversion to German following the Second Wold War resulted in the decision that it be played without words. Originally, the movement, which is part of Beethoven's 9th Symphony, was set to a poem by Friedrich Schiller called An die Freude, "To Joy," containing the famous phrase, Alle Menschen werden Brüder, "All men shall become brothers." Ode to Joy, words or not, was never meant to replace the anthems of member-states.

I don't like my own national anthem, or at least, I don't like it for this age. The Star-Spangled Banner is an amateur poem set to a popular English drinking song. Its talk of bombs and explosions and military glory are well-suited to Independence Day celebrations, where many forget the blood and severed limbs of war, the people blown to tiny bits, and cheer the crushing of the British and their oppressive taxes which, in truth, hardly anyone ever paid. The British overlords were sent packing and local, landed Americans continued to keep the peasants under their boots. Today, the Bush Administration continues to exalt the tradition of war-mongering and tax-hating by raiding American coffers to pay themselves and their constituency at the expense of education, social security and infrastructure, and even the very lives of their countrymen. In part, I blame the bloody anthem.

It's not that war doesn't bring out the best in people. It's that war also brings out the worst, and no one knows this as Europeans do. They have seen, committed and been victims of the most horrible crimes in history. There is the Shoah and the Second World War, of course. But there are also centuries of warlording, empire-building, crusading, Inquisiting, colonizing, revolting and ethnic cleansing that have killed millions; all for the sake of ideologies that no longer exist and martial dreams that everyone has forgotten.

European national anthems are rife with militancy, odes to God-ordained monarchs and to "the Fatherland." La Marseillaise, which we Americans also play on our Independence Day, is beautiful to hear, but violent as hell. Het Wilhelmus is sung as if spoken by William of Orange, fighting alongside the Dutch. Brabançonne and La Marcha Real refer (if only in name) to monarchy, Mazurek Dąbrowskiego, Kde domov můj?, Mu isamaa, mu õnn ja room, Il Canto degli Italiani, God Save the Queen and Deşteaptă-te, române!: war, fatherland, fatherland, war, monarchy/war and war respectively.

If an anthem is the window to the soul of a nation – and obviously, many are set in their ways -- then why is the Anthem of the European Union a tabula rasa? Is it, perhaps, because the EU has fought no epic war, was conceived to promote cooperation and peace instead of war. Or is it perhaps that so many centuries of failed social systems and horror have left the European Union hesitant to put forth any words for fear of setting yet another standard against which to define "the enemy" or "the other?"

In 1993, Maya Angelou, my countryman, wrote a poem – and we are talking poetry -- for President Clinton's inauguration entitled, On the Pulse of the Morning. It was written as the voice of America, speaking to her people, but it might as easily have been written for the European Union.

Each of you a bordered country,
Delicate and strangely proud,
Yet thrusting perpetually under siege.
Your armed struggles for profit
Have left collars of waste upon
My shore, currents of debris upon my breast.
…
If you will study war no more
Come, clad in peace and I will sing the songs
The Creator gave to me when I
And the tree and the stone were one.
Before cynicism was a bloody sear across your brow
…
I am yours – your passages have been paid
Lift up your faces, you have a piercing need
For this bright morning dawning for you
History, despite its wrenching pain,
Cannot be unlived, and if faced with courage
Need not be lived again

It continues to amaze me how many Europeans do not realize the incredible position they're in, or the things of which they are capable. The United States is in decline. My nation is being ripped apart for the sake of a few, super-rich people whose ideologies, in the end, are not so different than the kings, emperors and dictators who defrauded Europe, and the Star-Spangled Banner gives them a coloured flag and a martial theme to hide behind.

I recall Robert Service's Soldier of Fortune. It is set, appropriately, in a war in some bygone, colonial era. The narrator is surrounded by tribesmen with spears, who order him to deny his God or die. He searches his soul, and finds no reason, for God or country or ethnicity, to sacrifice his life. And then he thinks of his true love, many miles away, and of what she would think of her living but dishonoured man.

No! no! my mind's made up. I gaze above
Into that sky, insensate as a stone
Not for my creed, my country, but my Love
Will I stand up and meet my death alone
Then though it be to utter dark I sink
The God that dwells in me is not denied;
"Best" triumphs over "Beast,"—and so I think
Humanity itself is glorified…

Make no mistake. Service isn't talking about the tribesmen when he writes "Beast," for when the narrator refuses to deny his God, they set him free. The "Beast" is the thing in us, the thing with a nature for war, and the thing which whispers to us to sell our soul. No one ever really loved a nation-state, but rather those parts of home that that give us identity, that when we return from fighting wars, redeem us from the Beast.

The blank slate of the European Anthem has no language, has no words, merely the sentiment of Beethoven's soul-rousing spires of music, like those of the cathedrals that grace European cities. What shall be written upon this blank slate, this European anthem, this open invitation to define European identity? "All men are brothers," perhaps, or "Humanity itself is glorified…" Or shall it be yet another bloody, patriotic hymn to emperors and kings?

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{"commentId":1390820,"authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

Atticus Mullikin

If only they'd asked Aaron Copeland to write an anthem, or decided to use American the Beautiful.

It's curious, I submitted a version of this to the International Herald Tribune last year, and although they turned me down, I noticed this article appear on Christmas Eve past in the New York Times, which publishes the Tribune. Lo and behold, someone used Ode to Joy as a metaphor for a the European Union.

I mean, I don't think they stole the idea (Slavoj Zizek's was better than mine, anyway). But it's cool that I had the idea before someone else did.

{"commentId":1390820,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

1 vote

#1 - Tue Jan 22, 2008 8:28 PM EST

{"commentId":1391819,"authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

Atticus Mullikin

In looking back this morning, I noticed that I'd formatted the quotations incorrectly. My apologies, and the mistakes have been corrected.

{"commentId":1391819,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

#1.1 - Wed Jan 23, 2008 3:40 AM EST

{"commentId":1390864,"authorDomain":"raatkiraani"}

Raat ki Raani

It will come, sure enough it will come, my friend. But not before little matters like dissolved borders and a common language have first been overcome. And therein lies a much bigger European challenge. But they will ultimately be overcome and an anthem will surely be borne.

So says this optimistic European.

{"commentId":1390864,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"raatkiraani"}

1 vote

#2 - Tue Jan 22, 2008 8:46 PM EST

{"commentId":1391885,"authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

Atticus Mullikin

So says this optimistic European.

Well there's a rarity in and of itself. :)

Dissolved borders and a common language. I wonder if it isn't a "chicken and the egg" question. Can borders and language barriers be overcome without an ethos which both respects and, at the same time, transcends national interests - an ethos that defines the conditions European identity in the new age. Perhaps such an ethos is already present, but it doesn't seem to have trickled down to the citizenry.

{"commentId":1391885,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

1 vote

#2.1 - Wed Jan 23, 2008 5:08 AM EST

{"commentId":1392002,"authorDomain":"raatkiraani"}

Raat ki Raani

Can borders and language barriers be overcome...

I honestly think they can. It is very much a case of evolution through generations, in my view. I see that the last 50 years since the birth of the EU and a concept of common objectives at a broad level is still relatively young and immature. The generation in Western Europe that was directly affected by the horrors of WWII are still around in large numbers with those in Eastern Europe who since lived through the effects of the cold war, and the horrors of genocide in the former Yugoslavia still very raw.

Assuming the vision of a united Europe is allowed to flourish for another 50 years (as there is every reason to believe it will), the continent will have run past most of the generation who bear the pain. Going forward will therefore prove much easier to seek genuine integration.

The impression I get when talking to the younger generation in Western Europe (those below 25) gives me the optimism.

{"commentId":1392002,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"raatkiraani"}

2 votes

#2.2 - Wed Jan 23, 2008 7:24 AM EST

{"commentId":1392933,"authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

Atticus Mullikin

Assuming the vision of a united Europe is allowed to flourish for another 50 years (as there is every reason to believe it will), the continent will have run past most of the generation who bear the pain.

This is, perhaps, where we might differ - not in the sense that I disagree with you specifically, but in that I don't think the EU has 10 years of normative development, much less 50. While the body politic and corporate executives may strain themselves singing stability, there are a series of potential disasters bearing down on us with alarming speed. Even within the European Union, with some of the most progressive and enlightened initiatives of any governing body in the world, we aren't ready.

The advent of climate change, while it is widely understood to be a reality, seems to be approaching at an exponential, as opposed to linear, rate. There's already the increase in instances of violent weather, wildfires, flooding and water shortage, all costly occurrences. But there is also the very real chance of something more substantial, including the breakdown of the thermohaline circulation that keeps most of Europe from being an extension of Siberia. Meanwhile, the EU's long-term environmental plan goes all the way to 2050. It's largest benchmarks, which are supposed to be met by 2020, are already too late to meet the threat of an adjusted rate of climate change.

There's also the possible advent of Peak Oil, or at least the probable advent of a declining oil supply in the face of increasing demand. Far too much shipping and transit, even in the EU, is based on internal combustion engine vehicles. If the oil supply suddenly drops, even for a short while, the shock to the international economy, much less the transit sector, will be dramatic. The American economy, which has neither the mass-transit nor the sustainable initiatives of the EU, will collapse, and it will most certainly affect the EU.

And speaking of the U.S., how much is the EU currently dependent on a healthy American economy? In the wake of that documentary you posted today, "No End in Sight," and that reference it made to the American national debt, how long can the United States go on like this without an economic collapse? If you compound that with the aforementioned effects of both climate change and diminished oil supply, how much more precarious is the situation?

My prediction; the U.S. has about five years, maybe ten, before it caves in on itself. The only other part of the world capable of sustaining the international community is the EU. But the EU doesn't seem to understand the full gravity of the situation, nor is it prepared, at present, to alter this perspective.

I very much hope that I'm wrong about this, as I've said in other conversations before. I suppose that my sense of urgency, of the mobilization of society under a common ethos, is driven by these possibilities. I certainly understand if some see me as alarmist, because I am. But this is my perspective, for better or for worse.

{"commentId":1392933,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

2 votes

#2.3 - Wed Jan 23, 2008 12:47 PM EST

{"commentId":1393114,"authorDomain":"raatkiraani"}

Raat ki Raani

Thanks for sharing your thoughts Atticus. Very engaging.

I don't think the EU has 10 years of normative development, much less 50

Certainly agree that time is short for normative development in the world, let alone EU. However, this is exactly where I believe the EU has a better chance than any other region on the planet. Mainly because the foundations for transformative development exist in the EU, more so than anywhere else.

There is much that the EU needs to do to combat many of the challenges the world faces. Climate change is an important one amongst these but there are other equally pressing demands. Like demographics, social upheaval and political mindsets. Europe may have its differences but it does have a unity of vision and goals. India and China together pose a challenge to wrestle power but they also offer an opportunity for Europe to get its act together. And Japan may still have something to offer in that. It is not inconceivable that these three could come together in some kind of an alliance similar to the EEC in future. If so, there is every reason that the EU model may have an offshoot in Asia.

Globalization is here to stay and its impact is perhaps better understood in Europe than may appear. I share your concerns about the US although 5 years seems a shade too pessimistic. It'll take a little longer for it to lose its grip as a superpower. It will remain a strong economy; simply that it will face much stiffer competition from nimbler, more agile economies from the East to retain such a strong grip. How the US handles realities in a post-Bush era will be key to how it stands against the pressures it will face.

Transformation is the key watchword in my view. Glad to know that you have seen my seed from yesterday. Hard to tell who sees seeds without feedback. Thanks – I can see your thoughts will be a great addition on Newsvine.

{"commentId":1393114,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"raatkiraani"}

2 votes

#2.4 - Wed Jan 23, 2008 1:35 PM EST

{"commentId":1393608,"authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

Atticus Mullikin

Certainly agree that time is short for normative development in the world, let alone EU. However, this is exactly where I believe the EU has a better chance than any other region on the planet. Mainly because the foundations for transformative development exist in the EU, more so than anywhere else.

I couldn't agree more. That's why my wife and I moved here.

It is not inconceivable that these three could come together in some kind of an alliance similar to the EEC in future. If so, there is every reason that the EU model may have an offshoot in Asia.

Now that's interesting. If you have any more thoughts on that, or if there is any literature I might read, please share it/them.

I share your concerns about the US although 5 years seems a shade too pessimistic. It'll take a little longer for it to lose its grip as a superpower.

It is pessimistic. I sincerely hope I'm going overboard. But I see something inherent in the current American political culture, something that the Second World War purged from Europe, that is fairly dark and destructive. I think it is that element of our society that will ultimately be our downfall.

{"commentId":1393608,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

1 vote

#2.5 - Wed Jan 23, 2008 3:57 PM EST

{"commentId":1391625,"authorDomain":"mmhuffaker"}

Megan To Pagan

AM,

Although we disagree on some things, you are a great writer! I always enjoy your writing, learn something, and am made to think.

Great article. :)

{"commentId":1391625,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"mmhuffaker"}

#3 - Wed Jan 23, 2008 12:58 AM EST

{"commentId":1391835,"authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

Atticus Mullikin

Thank you Miss Pagan,

Kind words are always welcome, as is disagreement.

Incidentally, I haven't forgotten that I promised to write an article detailing what I see as the main culprit in fostering the environment in which terrorism grows, as per our conversation. I'll get on it soon.

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#3.1 - Wed Jan 23, 2008 4:01 AM EST

{"commentId":1392776,"authorDomain":"mmhuffaker"}

Megan To Pagan

I am truly looking forward to that article.

Thanks so much!

{"commentId":1392776,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"mmhuffaker"}

#3.2 - Wed Jan 23, 2008 12:03 PM EST

{"commentId":1392146,"authorDomain":"Pasi"}

PasiDeleted

{"commentId":1398183,"authorDomain":"farmer"}

oldfogey

Atticus, joining your views on political displacement in the near term with accelerating environmental changes, would you someday describe your vision of demographics around the world. In particular the coming geographic migrations. For some reason your writing is so readily accepted by my comprehension apparatus.

{"commentId":1398183,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"farmer"}

#5 - Thu Jan 24, 2008 6:41 PM EST

{"commentId":1398222,"authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

Atticus Mullikin

Hello Mr. oldfogey,

It would be my pleasure, although I must warn you that it would be pure speculation based on my own limited readings and experiences. I owe Miss to Pagan an answer to a question she asked me, in the form of an article, but then I'll be happy to attempt to tackle the topic you propose.

I'm happy to hear that my writings are easy on the comprehension apparatus. There's no greater labor, in my book, for a writer than to strive to be easily understood with as few words as possible.

{"commentId":1398222,"threadId":"207078","contentId":"1247259","authorDomain":"atticusmullikin"}

#5.1 - Thu Jan 24, 2008 6:53 PM EST

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ATTICUS MULLIKIN

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Of Anthems and European Identity

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