English to English translation

“To Joy”

The original ode is titled in German “An die Freude” which is simply “To (the) Joy” in (word literal) English. The Ido title then more closely matches the original.

Oh friends, not these tones!

The Ido words here are a surprisingly close match in terms of length to the original. It is worth noting here that this is one of the lines that was not in the ode itself, but was added by Beethoven. With the theme taken out of its symphonic context, and made more suitable for singing by the public in a national context, the music may have to be adapted and these lines dropped.

Instead, must-sing-us even more gaily

The imperative tense (as with all things in Ido) is clearly defined, but the nearest literal translation I can think of is “must sing”. Also, it is sad that in English, one of the words for “happy” has become unusable in some contexts because of an additional, often unintended, meaning. I doubt this is the case in all languages, though, and I would not want to hamper my choice of word purely because of a potential misunderstanding of one of its translation. On the contrary, people who identify with this word may choose to associate themselves with it so as to feel included.

and more joyfully.

Happy, gay and joyful are probably the only common ways of expressing the subject of the ode in English, and Ido too has limits on the number of words for a given concept.

Joy! Joy!

A relatively simple translation.

Joy beautiful sky-flame

Here the wonderful ambiguity of Ido is used. “Cielo” means both “sky” and “heaven”, so those that choose not to believe in heaven can take the more meteorological meaning if they wish. On the other hand, the idea of flame coming from the sky has religious overtones to those who believe, potentially representing the joy-giving Spirit of Heaven. A syllable-saving feature of Ido is also present here, with “cielo” dropping its final letter and combining with the next word to form a combined concept.

Child of eternity

While the original German personifies joy as a female, Ido is perfectly comfortable specifying merely “child”. To those who do not accept the idea of “eternity”, the idea of joy or anything else being eternal may not be common to them, but poetically this line may just be saying “Many things have come and gone in history, but joy has always remained”

We towards-go fire-drunk

Just like the German uses a single word for “fire-drunk”, so can Ido.

Your holy home-land.

The importance of having “homeland” (or if this was not gender neutral, “motherland”) in a national or nationalist song I think excuses the slight embellishment of the words, even if avoidance of terms like “Heavenly One” and “shrine” were not excuse enough. It could be argued that “holy” is still too prejudicial a word to use, but its meaning is deeply linked with the idea of being “healthy” and being “whole” and thus “united”. Add to that the meanings of “deserving respect” and “special / distinct” and I think this word is ideal for describing a homeland.

Your power reunites

The “your” in this may be a personification of “joy”, or a reference to one or more gods, as Ido cannot express a singular respectful pronoun as distinct from a plural respectful pronoun.

What custom divides

I had hoped to choose Schiller’s words over Beethoven’s here, as Schiller makes reference to people being divided by the sword, which encapsulates the division of the people of Europe by the World Wars. Unfortunately I had to learn the lesson of compromise myself here, as neither a Schiller-specific nor Beethoven-specific line would fit in the number of syllables.

All persons siblings-become-will

Ido’s powerful affix-based construction allows the change from “sibling” to “become siblings” at the cost of just one extra syllable.

Wherever you rest

The ambiguity of the “you” is still not broken.

Whoever successfully has been

The “-ab-” affix distinguishes between the very similar meanings of “was” and “has been”.

A friend of a friend

There is a particularly appealing double meaning here, as this line could mean “being a good friend to someone who is your friend” but also “being a good friend to a friend of your friend” which is the idea behind FOAF and the transitivity of trust.

Whoever a dear-little-one has gained

Using the diminuitive to refer to someone who is dear to you may not always be literally appropriate, but expressing your concern for them as they face figuratively mountainous challenges is a gesture I think most people can apply to themselves. I should probably point out that using the singular here is intended to mean “even one” not “precisely one” because some people may have many “dear little ones” such as their children. Regardless of this, the Ido line is much more neutral than the original, which in English is “Whoever has won a lovely woman”.

Must-mix your big-joy!

An affix is used to aggrandise the word for “joy”.

Indeed, even whoever claims

“Revendikas” for “claims” is a difficult choice because it has a meaning of “demands back”, but when talking about a soul (with the next line) there is the idea of “redemption” which can apply. The idea that a soul may be lost, or in slavery, and then returned to its rightful owner at a cost, is a poetic and meaningful one. Many people talk about having a “soul mate” or being “kindred spirits” and so “demanding back” a soul is one way to view the establishment of this bond.

A single soul on the Earth

“Single” here means “even one”, while a translation as “lonely” might be a stretch (see below for a better example of this ambuity). As for the word “soul”, it should be able to apply to anything from “a person”, to “one’s individuality”, to “the part of oneself that is closest to God”.

And whoever no-times has

“No-times” or “never” is clearly distinguished as an adverb in the Ido because of it’s “-e” ending.

Hides from this group.

A comment that lonely people might not want to be around happy people is not the most inclusive idea, but presumably anybody singing this would not be on their own, at least not in the long term, and thus would not feel the song applies to them here.

All beings drink joy

Not everyone would think that all creatures are capable of complex emotions like joy, but in as much as they do not feel sadness they can be viewed as having a certain contentment and a life without worries.

From a cup of nature

Personifying nature should be viewed as purely an artistic device and not a philosophical statement, but extending this personification to giving “nature” breasts is probably not maintaining a neutral stance. Drinking from a cup is a much more reasonable thing to imagine and sing about.

Every good-person, every bad-person

There is a distinction between the noun “goodness” and the noun meaning “a person who is good”.

Follow its rose-path

Ido’s gender non-specific (and humanity non-specific) pronoun allows “he / she / it” to all be represented in case people do have a specific idea for the gender of a personified “nature”. Again, two words are combined to express a single concept, here a “path covered with, or having the characteristics of, roses”.

Gives to us kisses, wine,

Wine is a product of nature (even if some of us wouldn’t personally drink it), and kisses are natural in some circumstances too, so this line needn’t mean that a personified nature is kissing anyone.

A friend even until death;

A friendship is another natural thing, and sometimes that friendship can be so strong that a friend will be with you until you die, or even sacrifice themselves for you. Some religious people, especially, feel they have a friend who has made this sacrifice for them.

Granted to worms: pleasure,

Again we have to imagine that animals, even with their limited perception of the world, are pleased with life, perhaps figuratively demonstrated by the fact they never complain or give up.

To guilty-ones: now grace.

Here we have the climax to the piece, excluding the ending. So important is this point, that I felt it best to change the last two lines from an original draft which went “Plezuro grantis ad vermi, // Graco ad la kulpanti.” Arguably my original idea scanned and flowed better, but it did break the symmetry of having all lines end in “-o” which was quite nice. More importantly, though, was that in the symphonic performance of the music, this line (and particularly the last two or three syllables) get repeated several times, and I felt that having the climactic word being “guilty-ones” seemed rather aggressive (or even “-panti” which just sounded silly), whereas my improvement made it “grace”. As for the importance of grace, what could be a more powerful theme than the idea of undeserving people (the guilty ones, or even “sinners”) being given that which they do not deserve, be it life, forgiveness, trust, freedom, or just purely joy. All these things at least partially arise out of nature, and are protected by our country.

Joyfully like the suns fly

Perhaps “disperse” would have been more scientifically accurate for describing an expanding universe, but the poetic meaning is not limiting, even attributing joy to the unhindered movement of these celestial bodies should not be a cause for concern.

Through the heavenly scheme

Again heavenly is synonymous with “of the sky” and the scheme needn’t be anything preordained.

Must-race, siblings, your race,

Siblings is a gender neutral replacement for “brothers”, and Ido is quite efficient here in using a similar word for the verb “to race” and the noun “a race”, but for clarity mandating different endings so they are immediately distinguishable in any context.

Gaily like a hero triumphs

The Ido word used for “hero” is gender-neutral, and running a race gaily like a hero and unstoppably like stars is a positive thing.

Must-become-embraced each person!

An embrace can express a loving sentiment, not least as a visible sign of the unity between people within a country who hold dear the values of that country. I should point out that the choice of “singla” over “omna” (“each” over “every”) was partly inspired by its similarity to the idea of someone being “single” as in “not having a partner”. This in some ways balances out the earlier idea in the lyrics that someone who has no one to call their own should leave the group of joyful people.

One kiss for everything!

This can express many ideas, such as one kiss being worth sacrificing everything for, or, perhaps as in an early version, the idea of a kiss of unity and joy spreading out across the whole world. There is also, optionally, the meaning which reminds us of Jesus’s betrayal with a kiss which was perhaps required for his death, and this fits well with the redemptive message of the words.

Siblings! Above the star-vault

Siblings (and the Ido word used here) is a gender-neutral word in place of “brothers” or an equivalent. Poetically, the heavens or the night sky can be viewed as a vault, similar to a canopy or tent as in the original words, although obviously the idea of stars being set on a 2 dimensional surface has now been superseded. Forming a single word for “star-vault” is a poetic and linguistic liberty.

Must be love.

Here the deviation from the original text is at some of its most egregious. Specifying the gender, number and humanity of whatever exists beyond the stars (and even mandating the existence at all of a literal entity) is bound to be contentious and out of place in a national anthem, so I think picking an abstract, poetic concept works best. Moreover, if people believe in something beyond the stars which defines love for them, then they see “love” as a synonym for that thing. Otherwise the sentence merely suggests that love is an emergent property, “beyond” and not present in any of the individual particles that make up the stars or any part of the observable universe, and yet is so profound that it has a value “beyond” that of the stars.

Accept it, each person?

Technically one should use the word “ka” or “kad” in Ido to distinguish this as a question, but I feel that in most natural languages it’s possible to inflect a sentence to turn it into a question, so this sort of construction would be valid in informal Ido. Note that the literal English translation here does not do it justice, as English is ambiguous with its verbs. “Accept” is the word used both in the present and imperative tenses, whereas it would be clear in Ido that the verb is only in the present tense. A better example for understanding the translation would be something like “Writing lyrics, Schiller?” (except that uses a gerund) or to Mrs Beethoven “Writes music, your son?”

Feel you the creation?

A similar brevity here, with the sentence not being a proper a question, and another example of altering the words to leave room for interpretation. Perhaps the words do not leave as much room as some would like, since “creation” does seem to suggest a “creator”, but if in doubt, the sentence does not specify what the “creation” is. From the context, it could be talking about the creation and spreading of love by humans, in which case this sentence means “Can you feel the love that has been created?” Besides, the answer may be “No.” like in other famous songs, or perhaps if it is more accurate “Wú.”.

Must-search above the star-vault!

Given that the preceding lyrics suggest that this “love” exists above the star-vault, this line suggests (perhaps hyperbolicly if love also exists in much more down-to-Earth places) that people should look there for it.

Above stars, truth

Similar to love abiding beyond the stars, truth might also abide there, which poetically implies that truth too is a powerful and eternal quality.

At this point the lines are repetitions of previous lines and do not need further translation or explanation.

I can well imagine groups of people from around Europe singing these patriotic words in Ido when joined together and celebrating in sporting, political, military, or anniversarial contexts. There is a question I haven’t asked yet, though. In the words of a friend of mine: “It’s great politics, but is it art?”