The Internationale

Translations

There have been a very wide variety of translations of the anthem. In 2002, Kuznar noted that the nature of these translations has varied widely. Many have been closely literal translations with variations solely to account for rhyme and meter but others have been done to encode different ideology perspectives and or to update contents to adapt the lyrics to relevant more contemporary issues.

The first English version has been attributed to the author Eugène Pottier himself, produced apparently after he fled the fall of the Paris Commune in June 1871 for temporary exile in Britain (until 1873, when he went on to the United States). The first US translation was by Charles Hope Kerr who heard it in De Geyter's setting in Lille in 1894 and published it as a pamphlet that year. It was later reproduced in Songs of the IWW, first published in 1909 and has been reprinted by Kerr's publishing house into the 21st century.

The first of many Italian versions signed by E. Bergeret, identified as Ettore Marroni, in 1901. The Dutch communist poet Henriette Roland Holst translated it into Dutch, with "Ontwaakt, verworpenen der aarde" ('Wake up, all who are cast away') at about the same time. By the time of the 1910 International Socialist Congress in Copenhagen, versions had appeared in 18 different languages, including a Danish one by A. C. Meyer, which was sung at the end of a cantata by 500 singers.

Russian version used in the Soviet Union

The Russian version was initially translated by Arkady Kots in 1902 and printed in London in Zhizn, a Russian émigré magazine. The first Russian version had only three stanzas, based on stanzas 1, 2, and 6 of the original, and the refrain. After the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, the text was slightly re-worded to get rid of "now useless" future tenses – particularly the refrain was reworded (the future tense was replaced by the present, and the first person plural possessive pronoun was introduced). In 1918 the chief editor of Izvestia, Yuri Steklov, appealed to Russian writers to translate the other three stanzas, which did eventually happen.

The Russian Internationale has been translated into many indigenous languages of Russia, including Tatar, Bashkir, Chuvash, Chukchi, Udmurt and Yakut.

Soviet cinema and theatre

Dmitry Shostakovich used "The Internationale" twice for the soundtrack to the 1936 Soviet film Girl Friends, once performed by a military-style band when a group of women are preparing for war, and a second time as a solo performance on a theremin.

Nikolai Evreinov's 1920 The Storming of the Winter Palace used both "The Internationale" and "La Marseillaise" symbolically in opposition to each other, with the former sung by the "Red platform" proletariat side and the latter sung by the "White platform" government side, the former starting weakly and in disarray but gradually becoming organised and drowning out the latter.

Toscanini and Hymn of the Nations

The change of the Soviet Union's national anthem from "The Internationale" to the "State Anthem of the USSR" was a factor in the production of the 1944 film Hymn of the Nations, which made use of an orchestration of "The Internationale" that Arturo Toscanini had already done the year before for a 1943 NBC radio broadcast commemorating the twenty-sixth anniversary of the October Revolution.

It was incorporated into Verdi's Inno delle nazioni alongside the national anthems of the United Kingdom (already in the original) and the United States (incorporated by Toscanini for a prior radio broadcast of the Inno in January of that year) to signify the side of the Allies during the Second World War.

Toscanini's son Walter remarked that an Italian audience for the film would see the significance of Arturo being willing to play these anthems and unwilling to play Giovinezza and the Marcia Reale because of his anti-Fascist political views. Alexandr Hackenschmied, the film's director, expressed his view that the song was "ormai archeologico" (nearly archaeological), but this was a countered in a letter by Walter Toscanini to Giuseppe Antonio Borgese, rejecting the objections of Borgese, Hackenschmied, and indeed the Office of War Information.

At the time, Walter stated that he believed that "The Internationale" had widespread relevance across Europe, and in 1966 he recounted in correspondence that the OWI had "panicked" when it had learned of the Soviet Union's plans, but Arturo had issued an ultimatum that if "The Internationale", "l'inno di tutte le glebe ed i lavoratori di tutto il mondo" (the anthem of the working classes of the whole world) was not included, that if the already done orchestration and performance were not used as-is, then they should forget about distributing the film entirely.

The inclusion of "The Internationale" in the Toscaninis' minds was not simply for the sake of a Soviet Union audience, but because of its relevance to all countries of the world. Although Walter did not consider "The Internationale" to be "good music", he considered it to be (as he stated to the OWI) "more than the hymn of a nation or a party" and "an idea of brotherhood".

It would have been expensive to re-record a new performance of the Inno without "The Internationale", and thus it remained in the film as originally released. Some time during the McCarthy Era, however, it was edited out of re-released copies, and remained so until a 1988 Library of Congress release on video, which restored "The Internationale" to the film.

Winston Churchill and National Anthems of the Allies

A similar situation had occurred earlier in the war with the BBC's popular weekly Sunday evening radio broadcast, preceding the Nine O'Clock News, titled National Anthems of the Allies, whose playlist was all of the national anthems of the countries allied with the United Kingdom, the list growing with each country that Germany invaded. After the Germans began their invasion of the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 (Operation Barbarossa), it was fully expected that "The Internationale", as the anthem of the Soviet Union, would be included in the playlist that day, but to people's surprise it was not, neither that week nor the week after. Winston Churchill, a staunch opponent of communism, had immediately sent word to the BBC via Anthony Eden that "The PM has issued an instruction to the Ministry of Information that the Internationale is on no account to be played by the B.B.C." (emphasis in the original).

Newspapers such as the Daily Express and Daily Mail were sharply critical of the Foreign Office, and questions were asked in the House of Commons. The ambassador Ivan Maisky recorded in his diary a conversation with Duff Cooper on 11 July 1941 where Cooper asked him if the music played after Vyacheslav Molotov's speech on 22 June would be acceptable to the Soviet Union, and he replied that it would not be. (The music was Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture.) On the evening of 13 July, the BBC instead played, in Maisky's words, "a very beautiful but little-known Soviet song", which he described as demonstrating "the British Government's cowardice and foolishness". Rather than risk offending the Soviet Union by continuing to pointedly refuse to play its national anthem in a radio programme entitled National Anthems, the BBC discontinued the programme. Six months later, on 22 January 1942, Churchill relented and lifted the prohibition.

This relaxation enabled "The Internationale" to be used in wartime broadcasts and films, and at public occasions, thereafter. The BBC's 1943 Salute to the Red Army had a mass performance of "The Internationale" at the Royal Albert Hall by the choir of the Royal Choral Society, the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and military bands, in front of the flag of the Soviet Union and following a speech by Anthony Eden. The day before, which was Red Army Day, troops and the audience had sung "The Internationale" to the Lord Mayor of Bristol. The 1944 film Tawny Pipit depicted schoolchildren in the fictional village of Lipton Lea welcoming the character Olga Boclova (based upon Ludmilla Pavlichenko) to their town by singing "The Internationale".

China

Qu Qiubai revised the translation of the lyrics into Chinese after having attended the Fourth Conference of Comintern in November 1921 and having not been able to join in the spontaneous singing by attendees there of "The Internationale" in their various home languages with their own Chinese rendition because the Chinese attendees did not have a good one. He proceeded, according to the political memoirs of his contemporaries, in 1923 to re-translate the lyrics from the original French at the organ in his cousin's home in Beijing, publishing them in New Youth, a journal of which he was the editor-in-chief. The Internationale was played at the closing ceremony of the 3rd National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party in 1923. Since the Congress, it became standard for The Internationale to be played in the closing ceremonies of each National Congress held by the CCP. This has become part of the cultural narrative of Qu's life, including in a 2001 television dramatisation of events, The Sun Rises from the East, where Qu is depicted as explaining to Cai Hesen that the former did not translate the song's title because he wished to make the Chinese version, which used a phonetic rendering of the French name using Chinese words "yingtenaixiongnaier", accessible to a multi-lingual non-Chinese-speaking audience. The television dramatisation included excerpts from the film Lenin in October, a popular film in China during the time of Mao with scenes that were set to "The Internationale".

Lenin in October was one of several films from Soviet cinema translated into Chinese in the 1950s that led to the widespread popularity of "The Internationale" in the early years of the PRC. Others include Lenin in 1918, a 1939 film which came to China in 1951, with "The Internationale" abruptly terminated at the point in the film that Lenin is shot by an assassin; and the 1952 The Unforgettable 1919 which came to China that same year and used "The Internationale" for a mass rally scene involving Joseph Stalin. Chinese films about martyrs to the CCP cause would begin to incorporate the song into pivotal scenes later in the 1950s, this use peaking in the 1960s with inclusion into such films as the 1965 Living Forever in Burning Flames depicting the execution of Jiang Jie. In the 1956 film Mother, the character Lao Deng, a local revolutionary leader, is depicted singing "The Internationale" on the way to his execution, and in the 1960 A Revolutionary Family, the son of the protagonist (in chorus with his fellow prisoners) also sings "The Internationale" on the way to his execution. It would become a leitmotif of Chinese Revolutionary (model) cinema.

Political memoirs of Li Dazhao's daughter Li Xinghua recount his explaining the lyrics of the song to her, he having encountered it on his travels with Qu in 1923 and during his visit to Moscow the following year. He also encouraged people to sing it during socialist activism training sessions in 1925 and 1926. As with Qu, the song forms part of the cultural narrative of his life, it being the widely accepted account of his execution in 1927 that he sang the song in the last moments of his life. As with Qu and Li, the song is found in many places in political histories of CCP leaders and martyrs to its cause, symbolising their socialist ideals, including Zhu De, Zhou Enlai, and Deng Xiaoping. It has also seen continued, and sometimes contradictory, uses over the decades as politics in China have changed, such as (for one example) Chen Yun's use in the 1960s to justify a new agricultural land allocation policy. It has maintained its status as a de facto CCP anthem, and its continued relevance over the decades can be seen in its inclusion in all three of the 1964 The East Is Red, the 1984 The Song of the Chinese Revolution, and the 2009 The Road to Prosperity.

While the song has a wide influence as an adjunct of official ideology, it has also been used in counter-cultural movements, such as the demonstrators in the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests singing it during their final retreat. Barbara Mittler maintains that this dual use of "The Internationale" by the government and by people demonstrating against it disproves any hypothesis that "a certain type of music 'depicts' a certain social environment". "The Internationale" continues to be popular with 21st century Chinese audiences, as exemplified by its reception by audience when sung at the second curtain call of the "Shocking" concert of Liu Han, Liao Changyong, and Mo Hualun.

Qu was hired as a translator for students at the Communist University of the Toilers of the East in Moscow, where he met Xiao San in 1922, who had newly arrived from France. There, Xiao was drawn into the performing arts as a vehicle for revolutionary messages and, in conjunction with other students, translated "The Internationale" and several Soviet songs from the original French and Russian into Chinese, separately from Qu's work in Beijing in 1923. Xiao re-worked his translation in 1939, adding to it an explanatory history. Ironically, the translation in the television dramatisation The Sun Rises from the East that is recited by the character of Qu, is not in reality Qu's translation at all, but is the 1949 official approved translation based upon Xiao's, that is additionally credited to Zheng Zhenduo. The 2004 film My Years in France, a biographical film of Deng Xiaoping, re-framed this history into a dramatic scene, set in 1920s Paris before Xiao leaves for Moscow, in which Zhou Enlai, Liu Qingyang, Zhang Shenfu, and others climb to the top of Notre Dame to sing "The Internationale" to the accompaniment of its bell Emmanuel, and the character of Xiao resolves at that point, instead, to translate the song into Chinese.

In addition to the Mandarin version, "The Internationale" also has Cantonese and Taiwanese Hokkien versions, occasionally used by communists or leftists in Hong Kong and Taiwan. The word "Internationale" is not translated in either version. There is also a Uyghur version, a Salar version, a Tibetan version, a Hmong version, a Chakhar Mongolian version, a Yi version, and a Zhuang version translated from the Mandarin Chinese version, used for ethnic minorities in China.

Other languages

Afrikaans translation

In the first half of the twentieth century, communists, unionists and activists of all races in South Africa sang the Internationale until the Communist Party and even loosely linked associations were suppressed from 1950. Although no Afrikaans translation from the early period has been published, Afrikaans-speaking unionists worked in significant numbers in the garment industry in the 1920s and 1930s, and were introduced to international socialism by the union secretary Solly Sachs. The Afrikaans translation that is available today, in the wake of the SACP's return to South Africa in 1990, is a distinctly post-apartheid version (2009) by the singer-sociologist Liela Groenewald. In this video, Liela Groenewald is accompanied by the brown South African musician Mervin Williams; their collaboration reflects the post-apartheid acknowledgement of Afrikaans as the language of a majority of brown (and a few black) in addition to white South Africans. English-speakers have sung a version of the British translation; for information on the Zulu version, see the paragraph on Zulu below.

Armenian translations

"The Internationale" has been translated into both standards of the Armenian language, Eastern and Western. The most famous Eastern Armenian translation, published in Moscow in 1928, was made by the revolutionary poet Yeghishe Charents, with musical arrangement by Romanos Melikian.

Bengali translation

"The Internationale" was first translated to Bengali by the rebel poet Kazi Nazrul Islam. Nazrul, who was greatly inspired by the tenets of Socialism and its relevance to India under British colonial occupation, authored numerous poems in Bengali highlighting socio-political issues, including gender and economic inequities, and social justice overall. Around 1927, Nazrul was approached by Muzaffar Ahmad, one of the Founders of the Communist Party of India, requesting that he translate the celebrated song into Bengali. While it maintains the essential theme of the original (via the English version), Nazrul inserted salient social issues into it within the Indian context. It was also translated by Hemanga Biswas and Mohit Banerji, that was subsequently adopted by West Bengal's Left Front.

English translations

The traditional British version of "The Internationale" is usually sung in three verses, while the American version, written by Charles Hope Kerr with five verses, is usually sung in two. The American version is sometimes sung with the phrase "the internationale", "the international soviet", or "the international union" in place of "the international working class". In English renditions, "Internationale" is sometimes sung as IN-tər-nash-ə-NAL-ee rather than the French pronunciation of . In modern usage, the American version also often uses "their" instead of "his" in "Let each stand in his place", and "free" instead of "be" in "Shall be the Human race".

Pete Seeger asked Billy Bragg to sing "The Internationale" with him at the Vancouver Folk Festival in 1989. Bragg thought the traditional English lyrics were archaic and unsingable (the Scottish musician Dick Gaughan and the former Labour MP Tony Benn disagreed), and composed a new set of lyrics. The recording was released on his album The Internationale along with reworkings of other socialist songs.

The English translation of a selection of Pottier's songs and speeches, Beyond the Internationale: Revolutionary Writings, includes, in addition to the traditional British version and Kerr's American version, a 1922 version endorsed by the Socialist Labor Party, as well as Bragg's adaptation and one by the Workers Party of Jamaica.

Filipino translation

There were three Filipino versions of the song. The first was composed by Juan Feleo of the Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas-1930 under the title "Pandaigdigang Awit ng Manggagawa" ('The International Worker's Anthem') which was translated from the English version. The second version was a retranslation of the first two stanzas on the basis of the French original by the Communist Party of the Philippines. The third version, which introduced the third stanza, was derived from both Chinese and French versions and translated by Jose Maria Sison, the CPP's founding chairman.

German translations

The best-known and still widespread German-language adaptation was created by Emil Luckhardt in 1896, in response to a commission from Wilhelm Liebknecht, member of the Socialist Party of Germany and one of the leaders of the Second International after Liebknecht heard the French original in Lille in 1894. Luckhardt translated the first, second, and sixth verses as well as the chorus from the French. Created in the context of the Second International, Luckhardt's text reflects the late 19th-century optimism of the Second International anticipating an imminent revolution.

Apart from Luckhardt's version, there are at least seven other German text variants—each relating to specific historical situations or ideologically divergent socialist, communist and anarchist alignments. In addition to the Luckhardt version mentioned above, there is a version penned by Franz Diederich (1908), and another written by the poet Erich Mühsam in 1919, Sigmar Mehring's version (1908) appeared after his 1915 death in a collection of songs of the Paris Commune edited in 1924 by his son Walter Mehring. In 1937, at which time German socialists and communists were scattered in exile, Erich Weinert, wrote a new version for the Thälmann Brigade fighting for the Republicans during the Spanish Civil War, Weinert's version became the standard in East Germany, where it was reprinted in a 1971 edition containing English, Russian, German and the original French, in commemoration of the centennial of the Paris Commune.

Indonesian/Malay translations

"The Internasionale" was known in the Dutch East Indies since the early 1920s. One of the earliest Indonesian/Malay adaptations was made by Suwardi Suryaningrat, later known as Ki Hadjar Dewantara as Indonesia's future Minister of Education, from a Dutch text. The adaptation was published in May 1920, although there are conflicting accounts regarding the media and publication date, namely either Het Indische Volk No. 28 on May 1, 1920, or Sinar Hindia No. 87 on May 5, 1920. The adaptation then circulated among labour, student, and left-wing movements in the Dutch East Indies and Indonesia. Ki Hadjar Dewantara was neither a member of the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI), then as the Indische Sociaal Democratische Vereeninging (ISDV), nor a member of the Sarekat Islam's red faction. It was reported that he was largely driven by a socialist, anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist notion which he hoped would contribute to the rise of Indonesian nationalism. Academics Budi Prihartanto and Y. Edhi Susilo have argued that Ki Hadjar's translation was adapted to local conditions at the time.

On December 19, 1948, Amir Sjarifuddin, along with ten figures associated with the Madiun Affair, reportedly sang "Indonesia Raya" and "Internasionale" before being executed. A second version, prepared by the PKI after 1951, came to be regarded as the official version until 1965, though it is unclear from which translation the PKI used. The Central Committee of the PKI was largely criticized by other international communist parties for having "removed the song’s proletarian spirit." Both Ki Hadjar's version and the PKI version were also later criticized by Indonesian leftist groups, including the Sixth March Collective, for undermining the spirit of the Paris Commune or the spirit of the proletariat. Another version was later created by A. Yuwinu and published on May 31, 1970, based on a comparison of Chinese and Russian texts. This translation was then adjusted to the Enhanced Spelling (EYD) guidelines which came into effect on August 17, 1972.

In late 1971, in the context of the centenary of the Paris Commune, an adaptation by the Sixth March Collective, attributed to Soepeno, Utuy Tatang Sontani, Agus J., and Suar Suroso, appeared, with references to the French version and comparisons with Russian, English, Chinese, German, and Dutch versions. Beyond so, there is the Ayik Umar Said version, the post-Suharto labour union version, and the Indonesian Trade Union Association (Gabungan Serikat Buruh Indonesia; GSBI) version.

Korean translations

"The Internationale" is used in both Koreas, though it is more commonly used in the North. The DPRK uses "The Internationale" in propaganda and music, Party Congresses, and even sports events. In South Korea, "The Internationale" has been used by labour unions and protestors, but remains less celebrated. A different set of lyrics, loosely based on the German version, is used in South Korea, while the North Korean version is based on the Soviet Russian version of "The Internationale". In addition, the refrain of the South Korean version is longer and does not repeat.

Persian translations

For the first time, Abolqasem Lahouti, an Iranian poet and songwriter, translated and standardised "The Internationale" into Persian. It was used as the official anthem of the short-lived Persian Socialist Soviet Republic and one of the main anthems of the communist Tudeh Party of Iran. In addition, after he settled in the Soviet Union, he translated his work into Tajik.

Portuguese translations

Originally translated to Portuguese by Neno Vasco in 1909 from the French version, a similar version was wildly disseminated during the general strike of 1917 by anarchists and anarcho-syndicalists. A slightly modified version is used various left-wing and far-left parties in Brazil.

Spanish translations

There are several Spanish versions, with distinct variations but without any attribution to single authors. The earliest is still sung by the Spanish Communist Party but it was apparently produced around 1910, before the split between Socialist and Communist parties across Europe around 1920. This version is also supported by the ruling Communist Party in Cuba. The Mexican version, in contrast, is based on earlier versions of "The Internationale", suggesting that it dates to the Mexican Revolution. The Argentine version was associated with the Argentine Socialist Party from 1958 to the junta of the generals in 1976.

In Latin America, "The Internationale" has also been translated into different indigenous languages, including Aymara, Guaraní, Nahuatl, and Quechua.

Swahili translation

In Kenya, "The Internationale" was translated into Swahili by the Communist Party Marxist - Kenya. It was declared the group's anthem during the second national congress in November 2024. Known as Wimbo wa Kimataifa, the Internationale, was translated by the then-party chairman, Mwandawiro Mghanga and performed by the party's band and released in a bundled album, together with other revolutionary songs and poems.

Vietnamese translation

The Vietnamese version of "The Internationale" was first translated by Ho Chi Minh under the pseudonym "Nguyễn Ái Quốc". Later translations were made by Trần Phú and Lê Hồng Phong, whose version became the standard adopted by the Communist Party of Vietnam.

Yiddish translation

A Yiddish translation of "The Internationale" first appeared in the collection Yidishe folks-lider ('Yiddish Folk Songs') edited by Moshe Beregovski and Itzik Feffer. It was published in Kyiv, capital of what was then the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, in 1938. Judging from metaphors that the Yiddish shares with the Russian version—both have "mind" or "spirit" boiling rather than la raison tonne or "reason thunders" in the French—and the translators' location in the Soviet Union, it is likely that they were working from the Russian rather than the original French.

Zulu translation

A version of "The Internationale" in Zulu, South Africa's most populous language, aired on South African radio in 1990, after the South African Communist Party resurfaced after forty years of exile, The translator has not been identified but the Zulu version is likely to have been in circulation at party meetings and similar events since Zulu-speakers joined the SACP in the 1920s. The translation may have been penned or authorised by Moses Kotane, who was secretary-general of the SACP from 1939 until his death in exile in 1978. Although heard often on public occasions in the 1990s, such as at the state funeral for Joe Slovo, long-time SACP leader and minister of housing in Nelson Mandela's cabinet, in 1995, it has receded from public airing as the party has lost influence in South Africa.

Audio files

Lyrics files

Allusions in other works

The "anthem" Beasts of England, Beasts of Ireland in the early pages of George Orwell's Animal Farm, has been described as a "parody" or a "reconfiguration" of "The Internationale"; Orwell's text states (as a "humorous introduction") that it was sung as "between Clementine and La Cucaracha",

William Carlos Williams' poem Choral: The Pink Church alludes to the lyrics of "The Internationale" in order to symbolise Communism, the poem otherwise barely mentioning Communism directly, Williams himself claiming to be "a pink [...] not a red" in a letter discussing the poem.

One of Aleksandr Lebedev-Frontov's most famous works, which hung in the headquarters of the National Bolshevik Party, is a poster of the French Fantomas aiming a pistol at the viewer, subtitled with the first line of the Russian version of "The Internationale".

The melody was briefly quoted by English composer John Ireland in the horn part of his 1937 cantata These Things Shall Be, immediately after the word "paradise" near the end of the penultimate stanza. Ireland soon reconsidered the allusion, asked the critic Edwin Evans not to identify the tune in the programme notes, and replaced the horn passage after the work's first public performance.

The Russian poet Vladimir Mayakovsky concluded his play Mystery-Bouffe with an "Internationale of the Future", set to the tune of the Internationale, but with lyrics describing a complete, perfect classless society as an existing fact.

Even though it stood on the far-right of the political spectrum, the Greek political party Golden Dawn employed a tune similar to "The Internationale" as its party anthem, the Hymn of the Golden Dawn, with a more militaristic and fascistic sound in the style of a military march. Its similar melody to a communist song possibly stemmed from the admiration of some of its members, such as Greek MP Ilias Panagiotaros, for Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, as a "great personality".

Documentary film on the anthem

Peter Miller produced and directed a half-hour documentary on the anthem with interviews with a range of people including Annette Rubinstein, Vladimir Grigoryevich Zak, Marina Feleo-Gonzalez, Pete Seeger, Dorothy Ray Healey, Li Lu and Billy Bragg. The film aims to provide a cultural history of the anthem that addresses the complexities of the relationships between the collective and the individual. The film was short-listed for the Academy Award nomination for the Best Short Documentary and won the Woodstock Film Festival, Best Short Documentary award.