www.geocities.com/Heartland/Forest/8483/anthem.html
This is the URL for an imperfect but lively and characteristically good-humoured recording of an instrumental version of the Irish national anthem, with bilingual lyrics, written by Brendan Behan's uncle in 1907. The words are on the national liberation theme -- which seems to me acceptable -- that "No more our ancient sireland shall shelter the despot or the slave". It used to be played at the night closing of the state TV, with the accompanying image of the national flag flying from the historic site of the uprising in the Dublin General Post Office. When in the 70s the armed anti-imperialist struggle developed in Ireland that programme was removed, and a sluggish, soporific version of the anthem was played, to the accompaniment of "poetic" images of running brooks and dewy spider webs.
A Catholic priest called (unsuccessfully) in the media for a "less militaristic" national anthem which would reflect our English, Welsh and Scottish heritage. I replied that while we were at it we should devise a new national flag which would do the same, and that a perfect answer would be the Union Flag (Union Jack) -- which by the way in the six counties we call the butcher's apron (blue stripes covered with red blood) -- and hate to see on film and TV used as a "cool" decoration in American student pads.
Nobody called for the French anthem to be criticised for proclaiming the imminence of the hour of glory and calling for watering the fields with impure blood. Nor the Hanoverian British anthem for calling on God, in the second verse, to confound the politics and knavish tricks of the Scots. (The august hotel which hosts government events in Belfast, UK, is called after the bloody Culloden field).
J. D.
----- Original Message ----- From: "Chris Doss" <lookoverhere1 at yahoo.com> To: <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org> Sent: Saturday, June 30, 2007 10:19 PM Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Fun with search engines: Write more lyrics