Tell Me about Your National Anthem

February 17 2013 , Written by Peanut Butter Blogger Published on #Old School

The 2013 RBS 6 Nations is currently on. I do not watch rugby and I won't talk about it, but national anthems. So, recently, a friend of mine sent a post on Facebook which reads she liked X and Y anthems in watching rugby, then another friend replied to her that Z anthem was also nice, to what she disagreed. And this is the beginning of an argument about what national anthems are nice and which ones are not, but the discussion deals particularly with this Z anthem. This mysterious Z is the French national anthem.

As a French, that discussion attracted me immediately. I was appalled that someone could criticize the anthem of my country, and on the other hand, I was astonished by my other friend and his knowledge of French history, defending an anthem which is not his. The last post reads nobody is forced to like an anthem or one another, and each of us can like what they want.

From there, I started to think: what make a good national anthem? Is it the music? the lyrics? both? In order to cheer me up, I've looked for a few posts on the internet about national anthems ranking and all of them consider the French national anthem as one of the best anthems, or even the best one sometimes. However, when peace came back to my mind, all the previous questions were erased by another one: who can decide if a national anthem is good or not? Who has the right to judge it?

Actually, I was hurt. I was hurt because this friend only judged my anthem by its music, I was hurt she didn't try to go beyond this frontier. A national anthem is not a simple song. It has not been created to be on the top of the charts. To tell the truth, I do not know many anthems, but I can say La Marseillaise is an anthem which tells you a story, French history.

La Marseillaise is said to be the song of revolution against tyranny. It is said French soldiers sang it when they were on the march to save France from its enemies. Each time I hear this song, it brings me back to the past. I didn't know the war, I cannot feel the suffering of the people, but I learned French history. When someone sings La Marseillaise, they thank the French people who fought for them in the past. It is an aggressive song, a hymn to freedom. It reminds French citizens why and how they are still here today.

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From Michael Curtiz's movie, Casablanca (1942). In response to the Nazi song, French people rise up and sing La Marseillaise. It is said Madeleine Lebeau, the woman who is crying, was not acting but showing her real feelings.

You can't judge a national anthem with the same criteria as for a song. A national anthem is a message which invites you to learn about its culture, to find out what links its people together. If someone asks me which is my favorite national anthem, I won't answer God Save the Queen because the queen has no meaning to me, I won't answer God Defend New Zealand as an atheist God has no meaning to me, I will just answer La Marseillaise. The best national anthem in the world is not La Marseillaise. The best national anthem is the one which deeply touches your heart, which brings you back to the tears of the people who fought for the future, which wakes up your pride to belong to a country.