"Music by: Pierre Degeyter, 1889; Written by: Eugène Pottier, Paris, June 1871; Eugène Pottier, was a refugee from the Paris Commune, who wrote the poem while in hiding in the aftermath of the massacre of the Communards. Pottier’s poem was only set to music in 1889, two years after his death, and published in 1894, and was virtually unknown until then, so it is very unlikely that he wrote an English version. He only lived briefly in England, spending most of his post-Commune exile in New York, Philadelphia, and Newark. He did a lot of work for the various socialist parties of the time in America, all of it in French and ran a French-language school. The International Arise ye workers from your slumbers Arise ye prisoners of want For reason in revolt now thunders And at last ends the age of cant. Away with all your superstitions Servile masses arise, arise We’ll change henceforth the old tradition And spurn the dust to win the prize. Refrain: So comrades, come rally And the last fight let us face The Internationale unites the human race. No more deluded by reaction On tyrants only we’ll make war The soldiers too will take strike action They’ll break ranks and fight no more And if those cannibals keep trying To sacrifice us to their pride They soon shall hear the bullets flying We’ll shoot the generals on our own side. No saviour from on high delivers No faith have we in prince or peer Our own right hand the chains must shiver Chains of hatred, greed and fear E’er the thieves will out with their booty And give to all a happier lot. Each at the forge must do their duty And we’ll strike while the iron is hot. Adaptation of Charles H. Kerr translation from the original, for The IWW Songbook (34th Edition). Arise ye pris’ners of starvation Arise ye wretched of the earth For justice thunders condemnation A better world’s in birth! No more tradition’s chains shall bind us Arise, ye slaves, no more in thrall; The earth shall rise on new foundations We have been naught we shall be all. Refrain: ’Tis the final conflict Let each stand in his place The International Union Shall be the human race. We want no condescending saviors To rule us from their judgement hall We workers ask not for their favors Let us consult for all. To make the theif disgorge his booty To free the spirit from its cell We must ourselves decide our duty We must decide and do it well. The law oppresses us and tricks us, The wage slave system drains our blood; The rich are free from obligation, The laws the poor delude. Too long we’ve languished in subjection, Equality has other laws; "No rights", says she "without their duties, No claims on equals without cause." Behold them seated in their glory The kings of mine and rail and soil! What have you read in all their story, But how they plundered toil? Fruits of the workers’ toil are buried In strongholds of the idle few In working for their restitution The men will only claim their due. We toilers from all fields united Join hand in hand with all who work; The earth belongs to us, the workers, No room here for the shirk. How many on our flesh have fattened! But if the norsome birds of prey Shall vanish from the sky some morning The blessed sunlight then will stay. https://www.marxists.org/history/ussr/sounds/lyrics/international.htm"

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